- Robinson, Jamie;
- Carroll, Robert;
- Bastarache, Lisa;
- Chen, Qingxia;
- Pirruccello, James;
- Mou, Zongyang;
- Wei, Wei-Qi;
- Connolly, John;
- Mentch, Frank;
- Crane, Paul;
- Hebbring, Scott;
- Crosslin, David;
- Gordon, Adam;
- Rosenthal, Elisabeth;
- Stanaway, Ian;
- Hayes, M;
- Wei, Wei;
- Petukhova, Lynn;
- Namjou-Khales, Bahram;
- Zhang, Ge;
- Safarova, Mayya;
- Walton, Nephi;
- Still, Christopher;
- Bottinger, Erwin;
- Loos, Ruth;
- Murphy, Shawn;
- Jackson, Gretchen;
- Abumrad, Naji;
- Kullo, Iftikhar;
- Jarvik, Gail;
- Larson, Eric;
- Weng, Chunhua;
- Roden, Dan;
- Khera, Amit;
- Denny, Joshua
OBJECTIVE: High BMI is associated with many comorbidities and mortality. This study aimed to elucidate the overall clinical risk of obesity using a genome- and phenome-wide approach. METHODS: This study performed a phenome-wide association study of BMI using a clinical cohort of 736,726 adults. This was followed by genetic association studies using two separate cohorts: one consisting of 65,174 adults in the Electronic Medical Records and Genomics (eMERGE) Network and another with 405,432 participants in the UK Biobank. RESULTS: Class 3 obesity was associated with 433 phenotypes, representing 59.3% of all billing codes in individuals with severe obesity. A genome-wide polygenic risk score for BMI, accounting for 7.5% of variance in BMI, was associated with 296 clinical diseases, including strong associations with type 2 diabetes, sleep apnea, hypertension, and chronic liver disease. In all three cohorts, 199 phenotypes were associated with class 3 obesity and polygenic risk for obesity, including novel associations such as increased risk of renal failure, venous insufficiency, and gastroesophageal reflux. CONCLUSIONS: This combined genomic and phenomic systematic approach demonstrated that obesity has a strong genetic predisposition and is associated with a considerable burden of disease across all disease classes.