Association of salt added to food with risk of cardiovascular diseases: A 2-sample Mendelian randomization study

Salt added to food is believed to potentially influence the risk of cardiovascular diseases (CVD), however, more evidence needs further verification. Here, we conducted a 2-sample Mendelian randomization (MR) study to systematically investigate the associations of salt added to food with 11 types of cardiovascular diseases in the general population. The primary MR analysis adopts the inverse-variance weighting (IVW) method, complemented by ancillary analyses utilizing IVW (fixed effects), weighted medium, maximum likelihood, and penalized weighted median methodologies. The main pleiotropy of genetic variation and sensitivity analysis were correspondingly applied to test the reliability of the results, and the MR-Egger test are the core evaluation methods. Notably, genetically predicted salt added to food demonstrates causal associations with vein thromboembolism (IVW odds ratio [OR]: 1.0084, 95% confidence interval [CI]: 1.0024-1.0143, P = .0056), atrial fibrillation and flutter (IVW OR: 1.3176, 95% CI: 1.0154-1.7098, P = .0380), ischemic stroke (IVW OR: 1.1852, 95% CI: 1.0092-1.3918, P = .0383) and peripheral artery disease (IVW OR: 1.0040, 95% CI: 1.0015-1.0065, P = .0016). These findings provide valuable insights that may guide the development of targeted prevention strategies and interventions focused on dietary habits in the context of cardiovascular diseases.