Blood lipid profile, HbA1c, fasting glucose, and diabetes: a cohort study and a two-sample Mendelian randomization analysis

Purpose The prevalence of diabetes is increasing worldwide. The associations between the lipid profile and glycated hemoglobin (HbA1c), fasting glucose, and diabetes remain unclear, so we aimed to perform a cohort study and a two-sample Mendelian randomization (MR) study to investigate the causality between blood lipid profile and HbA1c, fasting glucose, and diabetes. Methods A total of 25,171 participants from the Taiwan Biobank were enrolled. We applied a cohort study and an MR study to assess the association between blood lipid profile and HbA1c, fasting glucose, and diabetes. The summary statistics were obtained from the Asian Genetic Epidemiology Network (AGEN), and the estimates between the instrumental variables (IVs) and outcomes were calculated using the inverse-variance weighted (IVW) method. A series of sensitivity analyses were performed. Results In the cohort study, high-density lipoprotein cholesterol (HDL-C) was negatively associated with HbA1c, fasting glucose, and diabetes, while the causal associations between HDL-C and HbA1c (β IVW = − 0.098, p = 0.003) and diabetes (β IVW = − 0.594, p < 0.001) were also observed. Furthermore, there was no pleiotropy effect in this study using the MR-Egger intercept test and MR-PRESSO global test. Conclusions Our results support the hypothesis that a genetically determined increase in HDL-C is causally related to a reduction in HbA1c and a lower risk of diabetes.