Sleep duration, genetic susceptibility, and Alzheimer's disease: a longitudinal UK Biobank-based study

Abstract Background Alzheimer's disease (AD) is the most frequently occurring type of dementia. Concurrently, inadequate sleep has been recognized as a public health epidemic. Notably, genetic and environmental factors are now considered contributors to AD progression. Objective To assess the association between sleep duration, genetic susceptibility, and AD. Methods and results Based on 483,507 participants from the UK Biobank (UKB) with an average follow-up of 11.3 years, there was a non-linear relationship between AD incidence and sleep duration (P for non-linear 9 h/night). No statistically significant interaction was identified between sleep duration and the AD-GRS (Alzheimer's disease genetic risk score, P for interaction = 0.45) using Cox proportional risk model. Compared with the participants who had a low AD-GRS and normal sleep duration, there was associated with a higher risk of AD in participants with a low AD-GRS and long sleep duration (HR = 3.4806; 95% CI 2.0011–6.054, p 9 h/night) was significantly associated with a higher risk of AD, regardless of high, intermediate or low AD-GRS. Prolonged sleep duration may be one of the clinical predictors of a higher risk of AD.