Olga E Titova

• PhD
• Associate professor at Uppsala University

Background and purpose: Studies of sleep duration in relation to specific types of stroke are scarce. Moreover, the results are inconclusive and causality remains unclear. Our objective was to investigate whether sleep duration is associated with risk of stroke and its types using observational and Mendelian randomization designs. Methods: The p...

Studies of sleep duration in relation to the risk of site‐specific cancers other than breast cancer are scarce. Furthermore, the available results are inconclusive and the causality remains unclear. We aimed to investigate the potential causal associations of sleep duration with overall and site‐specific cancers using the Mendelian randomization (M...

Background Cigarette smoking is a well-known risk factor for cardiovascular disease (CVD), but whether smokeless tobacco such as snuff is associated with the risk of CVD is still unclear. We investigated the association of the use of Swedish oral moist snuff (snus) with a broad range of CVDs and CVD mortality. Methods We used data from a populatio...

Background Sleep-disordered breathing (SDB) may contribute to development of stroke. However, findings are inconclusive. We investigated whether SDB-related symptoms are associated with incidence of stroke and its types in a general community sample of adult men and women as well as to perform Mendelian randomization (MR) analysis. Methods We used...

Aims Anger may increase the risk of cardiovascular diseases (CVDs) but previous findings are inconclusive and large prospective studies are needed. We investigated whether frequency of strong anger is associated with the incidence of specific CVDs and CVD mortality, and if sex, age, and cardiometabolic risk factors modifies these associations. Met...

Background How cardiovascular diseases (CVD) predispose to a higher risk of fragility fractures is not well understood. Both contribute to significant components of disease burden and health expenditure. Poor bone quality, central obesity, sarcopenia, falls, and low grip strength are independent risk factors for hip and other fragility fractures an...

Background and aims Few population-based cohort studies, including both men and women, have explored circulating proteins associated with incident myocardial infarction (MI). This study investigated the relationships between circulating cardiometabolic-related proteins and MI risk using cohort-based and Mendelian randomization (MR) analyses and exp...

Background Proteomic profiling could potentially disclose new pathophysiological pathways for cardiovascular diseases (CVD) and improve prediction at the individual level. We therefore aimed to study the plasma protein profile associated with the incidence of different CVDs. Methods Plasma levels of 245 proteins suspected to be linked to CVD or me...

We appreciate the interest of Dr. Kawada in our recent study investigating the mediation effects of blood biomarkers in the association between statin use and cognitive performance in the UK Biobank. We would like to provide further insights on the modifying effect of sex in the relationship between statin use and dementia, as well as statin lipoph...

Background The underlying molecular pathways for the effect of excess fat mass on cardiometabolic diseases is not well understood. Since body mass index is a suboptimal measure of body fat content, we investigated the relationship of fat mass measured by dual-energy X-ray absorptiometry with circulating cardiometabolic proteins. Methods We used da...

Statins are widely used for cardiovascular disease prevention but their effects on cognition remain unclear. Statins reduce cholesterol concentration and have been suggested to provide both beneficial and detrimental effects. Our aim was to investigate the cross-sectional and longitudinal association between statin use and cognitive performance, an...

Aims We conducted observational and Mendelian randomization (MR) analyses to explore the associations between blood proteins and risk of peripheral artery disease (PAD). Methods and results The observational cohort analyses included data on 257 proteins estimated in fasting blood samples from 12,136 Swedish adults aged 55-94 years who were followe...

Aims Sleep duration has been associated with cardiovascular disease, however the effect of sleep on peripheral artery disease (PAD) specifically remains unestablished. We conducted observational and Mendelian randomization (MR) analyses to assess the associations of sleep duration and daytime napping with PAD risk. Methods and results Sleep traits...

We conducted cohort and Mendelian randomisation (MR) analyses to examine the associations of circulating proteins with risk of venous thromboembolism (VTE) to provide evidence basis for disease prevention and drug development. Cohort analysis was performed in 11 803 participants without baseline VTE. Cox regression was used to estimate the associat...

Introduction: Cigarette smoking is a known risk factor for Type 2 diabetes, but evidence regarding former smoking and moist snuff (snus) use and Type 2 diabetes risk is inconclusive. This study investigated the relationships of cigarette smoking and Swedish snus use with the risk of Type 2 diabetes in a cohort of middle-aged and elderly participan...

Introduction: Sleep duration and quality have been linked to atherosclerosis, however the effects on peripheral artery disease (PAD) specifically have not been well characterized. We conducted cohort, case-control, and Mendelian randomization analyses across three large multinational samples (Sweden, United Kingdom, United States) to evaluate assoc...

Morning chronotype has been associated with a reduced risk of prostate and breast cancer. However, few studies have examined whether chronotype is associated with digestive tract cancer risk. We conducted a Mendelian randomization (MR) study to assess the associations of chronotype with major digestive tract cancers. A total of 317 independent gene...

Sleep-disordered breathing may increase the risk of cardiovascular diseases, but observational findings are inconclusive. We investigated whether sleep-disordered breathing-related symptoms are associated with risk of several cardiovascular diseases using data from a cohort study and by performing Mendelian randomization analyses. The cohort study...

Tobacco smoking is an important risk factor for peripheral artery disease (PAD), but it remains unknown whether smokeless tobacco, such as Swedish snuff (snus), is also associated with this disease. We used data from the Cohort of Swedish Men including 24,085 men. Individuals were grouped into never, past, and current snus dippers as well as never,...

Physical conditions in children and adolescents are often under reported during mainstream school years and may underlie mental health disorders. Additionally, comparisons between younger and older schoolchildren may shed light on developmental differences regarding the way in which physical conditions translate into conduct problems. The aim of th...

Background Sleep duration and quality has been associated with cardiovascular disease, however the effect of sleep on peripheral artery disease (PAD) specifically remains unestablished. We conducted cohort, case-control, and Mendelian randomization (MR) analyses to assess the associations of sleep duration and quality with PAD risk. Methods Sleep...

Subjective sleep reports are widely used research tools in epidemiology. Whether sleep reports can differ between seasons is less clear. Using multivariable binary or multinomial logistic regression analyses, in the present Swedish cross-sectional two-centre cohort study (N = 19,254; mean age 61 years), we found that participants surveyed during th...

Underweight or overweight in adolescence is linked to several adverse health outcomes. Less evidence exists about the association between weight status and school-related psychosocial characteristics in high income countries. We sought to investigate the relationship between weight status and psychosomatic and school-related complaints with a focus...

Background: Conduct disorders may be linked to common physical conditions in childhood and adolescence, and are often under reported during mainstream school years, which may lead to more serious mental health concerns in adulthood. The aim of the study was to examine the link between specific psychosomatic complaints and adolescent conduct problem...

Introduction Preliminary findings suggest that pets may improve the owner’s sleep via companionship, security, physical activity, and relaxation. On the other hand, pets can disrupt the owner’s sleep. Due to the heterogeneity of the results and the low number of studies in this field, more studies with a bigger sample size are needed to explore thi...

Preliminary findings suggest that pets may impact the owner’s sleep. By using data from the Swedish CArdioPulmonary bIoimage Study (SCAPIS) cohort, we aimed to investigate the association of pet ownership with the following self-reported sleep outcomes in 3788 to 4574 participants: (i) achieving the recommended daily sleep duration for adults (i.e....

Improving health and safety at work has been an important issue for the European Union since the 1980s. The existing literature supports that shift work is associated with multiple indicators of poor health but frequently neglects the potential impact of occupational hazards. This study aims at describing and comparing the exposure to different wor...

Executive function is defined as a set of cognitive skills that are necessary to plan, monitor, and execute a sequence of goal-directed complex actions. Executive function is influenced by a variety of factors, including habitual sleep duration and diabetes. In the present study, we investigated in 18,769 Swedish adults (mean age: 61 y) the associa...

Objective: The present study sought to examine whether self-reported sleep duration is linked to an adverse body composition in 19,709 middle-aged and older adults (45-75 years old). Methods: All variables used in the present study derived from the Swedish EpiHealth cohort study. Habitual sleep duration was measured by questionnaires. Body composit...

Objective To examine whether the relationship between the metabolic syndrome (MetS) and various sleep parameters [sleep duration, symptoms of sleep-disordered breathing (SDB), and sleep disturbances] varies by age. Methods Waist circumference, blood pressure, triglycerides, high-density lipoprotein cholesterol, and fasting glucose were used to det...

Background: Studies of epigenetics and transcriptional activity in adolescents may provide knowledge about possible preventive strategies of depression. Methods: We present a methylome-wide association study (MWAS) and cohort validation analysis of depression in adolescents, in two separate cohorts: discovery (n=93) and validation data set 1 (n=...

Genome-wide association studies have identified a number of single-nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) that are associated with psychiatric diseases. Increasing body of evidence suggests a complex connection of SNPs and the transcriptional and epigenetic regulation of gene expression, which is poorly understood. In the current study, we investigated th...

Shift work has been proposed to promote cognitive disturbances in humans; however, conflicting evidence is also present. By utilizing data from 7,143 middle-aged and elderly humans (45-75 years) who participated in the Swedish EpiHealth cohort study, the present analysis sought to investigate whether self-reported shift work history would be associ...

Single-nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) of the fat mass and obesity associated (FTO) gene are linked to obesity, but how these SNPs influence resting-state neural activation is unknown. Few brain-imaging studies have investigated the influence of obesity-related SNPs on neural activity, and no study has investigated resting-state connectivity patter...

Understanding how genetics influences obesity, brain activity, and eating behavior will add important insight for developing strategies for weight-loss treatment, as obesity may stem from different causes and as individual feeding behavior may depend on genetic differences. To this end, we examined how an obesity risk-allele for the FTO gene affect...

Objective: To examine associations of self-reported sleep disturbance and short sleep duration with the risk for academic failure. Methods: A cohort of ~40,000 adolescents (age range: 12–19 years) who were attending high school grades 7, 9, and 2nd year of upper secondary school in the Swedish Uppsala County were invited to participate in the Life...

To examine the association between dietary habits, cognitive functioning and brain volumes in older individuals, data from 194 cognitively healthy individuals who participated in the Prospective Investigation of the Vasculature in Uppsala Seniors cohort were used. At age 70, participants' kept diaries of their food intake for one week. These record...

Background Structural imaging studies demonstrate brain tissue abnormalities in eating disorders, yet a quantitative analysis has not been done. Methods In global and regional meta-analyses of 9 voxel-based morphometry (VBM) studies, with a total of 228 eating disorder participants (currently ill with anorexia nervosa), and 240 age-matched healthy...

In the present study, we tested whether elderly with a high dietary intake of eicosapentaenoic acid (EPA) and docosahexaenoic acid (DHA) would have higher cognitive test scores and greater brain volume than those with low dietary intake of these fatty acids. Data were obtained from the Prospective Investigation of the Vasculature in Uppsala Seniors...

Smoking during pregnancy has been shown to be detrimental for the developing fetus. The effects of active and passive maternal smoking on umbilical cord serum levels of vitamin A and vitamin E were examined. Secondary measures included anthropometric parameters in the newborn. Maternal and umbilical cord serum levels of vitamins A and E were measur...