Reliability and validity of the UK Biobank cognitive tests

UK Biobank is a health resource with data from over 500,000 adults. The cognitive assessment in UK Biobank is brief and bespoke, and is administered without supervision on a touchscreen computer. Psychometric information on the UK Biobank cognitive tests are limited. Despite the non-standard nature of these tests and the limited psychometric information, the UK Biobank cognitive data have been used in numerous scientific publications. The present study examined the validity and short-term test-retest reliability of the UK Biobank cognitive tests. A sample of 160 participants (mean age = 62.59, SD = 10.24) was recruited who completed the UK Biobank cognitive assessment and a range of well-validated cognitive tests ('reference tests'). Fifty-two participants returned 4 weeks later to repeat the UK Biobank tests. Correlations were calculated between UK Biobank tests and reference tests. Two measures of general cognitive ability were created by entering scores on the UK Biobank cognitive tests, and scores on the reference tests, respectively, into separate principal component analyses and saving scores on the first principal component. Four-week test-retest correlations were calculated for UK Biobank tests. UK Biobank cognitive tests showed a range of correlations with their respective reference tests, i.e. those tests that are thought to assess the same underlying cognitive ability (mean Pearson r = 0.53, range = 0.22 to 0.83, p≤.005). The measure of general cognitive ability based on the UK Biobank cognitive tests correlated at r = 0.83 (p < .001) with a measure of general cognitive ability created using the reference tests. Four-week test-retest reliability of the UK Biobank tests were moderate-to-high (mean Pearson r = 0.55, range = 0.40 to 0.89, p≤.003). Despite the brief, non-standard nature of the UK Biobank cognitive tests, some tests showed substantial concurrent validity and test-retest reliability. These psychometric results provide currently-lacking information on the validity of the UK Biobank cognitive tests

Mental health in UK Biobank - development, implementation and results from an online questionnaire completed by 157 366 participants: a reanalysis

Background UK Biobank is a well-characterised cohort of over 500 000 participants including genetics, environmental data and imaging. An online mental health questionnaire was designed for UK Biobank participants to expand its potential. Aims Describe the development, implementation and results of this questionnaire. Method An expert working group designed the questionnaire, using established measures where possible, and consulting a patient group. Operational criteria were agreed for defining likely disorder and risk states, including lifetime depression, mania/hypomania, generalised anxiety disorder, unusual experiences and self-harm, and current post-traumatic stress and hazardous/harmful alcohol use. Results A total of 157 366 completed online questionnaires were available by August 2017. Participants were aged 45–82 (53% were ≥65 years) and 57% women. Comparison of self-reported diagnosed mental disorder with a contemporary study shows a similar prevalence, despite respondents being of higher average socioeconomic status. Lifetime depression was a common finding, with 24% (37 434) of participants meeting criteria and current hazardous/harmful alcohol use criteria were met by 21% (32 602), whereas other criteria were met by less than 8% of the participants. There was extensive comorbidity among the syndromes. Mental disorders were associated with a high neuroticism score, adverse life events and long-term illness; addiction and bipolar affective disorder in particular were associated with measures of deprivation. Conclusions The UK Biobank questionnaire represents a very large mental health survey in itself, and the results presented here show high face validity, although caution is needed because of selection bias. Built into UK Biobank, these data intersect with other health data to offer unparalleled potential for crosscutting biomedical research involving mental health

Microstructural differences in white matter tracts across middle to late adulthood : a diffusion MRI study on 7167 UK Biobank participants

Acknowledgements This research was approved by the UK Biobank (application number: 24089) and was supported by the Roland Sutton Academic Trust (grant number: 0039/R/16) and Taiwan National Health Research Institute (NHRI-EX109-10928NI). We acknowledge the valuable contributions of members of the UK Biobank Imaging Working Group and the UK Biobank coordinating center. The UK Biobank (including the imaging enhancement) was supported by the UK Medical Research Council and the Wellcome Trust. The authors are grateful for the provision of simultaneous multislice (multiband) pulse sequence and reconstruction algorithms by the Center for Magnetic Resonance Research, University of Minnesota. Finally, the authors are extremely grateful to all UK Biobank study participants, who have generously donated their time to make this resource possible. This article was edited by Wallace Academic Editing.Peer reviewedPostprin

Use of proton pump inhibitors and histamine-2 receptor antagonists and risk of gastric cancer in two population-based studies

Acknowledgements Access to UK Biobank data was approved and facilitated by UK Biobank (application number: 34374). Access to Primary Care Clinical Informatics Unit (PCCIU) data was approved and facilitated by the PCCIU Research team, University of Aberdeen. Access to the UK Biobank was funded by a Cancer Research UK Population Research Postdoctoral Fellowship awarded to ÚCMcM. Funding: Access to the UK Biobank was funded by a Cancer Research UK Population Research Postdoctoral Fellowship awarded to ÚCMcM. Liu P was supported by a joint scholarship from Queen's University Belfast and the Chinese Scholarship Council (201708060458). Data availability: The UK Biobank data (https://www.ukbiobank.ac.uk/) and PCCIU data (https://www.abdn.ac.uk/iahs/research/primary-care/pcciur/) are available, following the access procedures, for researchers to access to conduct health related research in the public interest.Peer reviewedPostprin

Potential recruitment into a clinical trial of vascular secondary prevention medications in cerebral small vessel disease, based on concomitant medication use

This research has been conducted using the UK Biobank resource. The authors are grateful to UK Biobank participants. UK Biobank was established by the Wellcome Trust medical charity, Medical Research Council, Department of Health, Scottish Government, and the Northwest Regional Development Agency. It has also had funding from the Welsh Assembly Government and the British Heart Foundation.Peer reviewedPublisher PD

The epidemiology of regular opioid use and its association with mortality : Prospective cohort study of 466 486 UK biobank participants

Acknowledgments This work did not receive any external sources of funding. Data was supplied by UK Biobank under the terms of application reference number 1144. Data sharing agreement On acceptance of a manuscript using UK Biobank data, the authors are required to submit the dataset (including any derived variables) and the analysis programs to UK Biobank. Data are available to researchers by application.Peer reviewedPublisher PD

Brainstem volume mediates seasonal variation in depressive symptoms : A cross sectional study in the UK Biobank cohort

This research has been conducted using the UK Biobank resource. UK Biobank was established by the Wellcome Trust medical charity, Medical Research Council, Department of Health, Scottish Government and the Northwest Regional Development Agency. This work was supported by the Aberdeen Biomedical Imaging Centre with financial support from the Roland Sutton Academic Trust (RSAT-0039/R/16) and the Saudi Cultural Bureau in contact with Jazan University (PhD scholarship for NAM). Data Availability: The datasets processed and analysed during the current study are available from the online open access UK Biobank repository (https://www.ukbiobank.ac.uk/). This research was conducted under the UK Biobank Resource under Application Number 24089 (PI Waiter).Peer reviewedPublisher PD

Cohort profile: design and methods in the eye and vision consortium of UK Biobank

PURPOSE: To describe the rationale, methods and research potential of eye and vision measures available in UK Biobank. PARTICIPANTS: UK Biobank is a large, multisite, prospective cohort study. Extensive lifestyle and health questionnaires, a range of physical measures and collection of biological specimens are collected. The scope of UK Biobank was extended midway through data collection to include assessments of other measures of health, including eyes and vision. The eye assessment at baseline included questionnaires detailing past ophthalmic and family history, measurement of visual acuity, refractive error and keratometry, intraocular pressure (IOP), corneal biomechanics, spectral domain optical coherence tomography (OCT) of the macula and a disc-macula fundus photograph. Since recruitment, UK Biobank has collected accelerometer data and begun multimodal imaging data (including brain, heart and abdominal MRI) in 100 000 participants. Dense genotypic data and a panel of 20 biochemistry measures are available, and linkage to medical health records for the full cohort has begun. FINDINGS TO DATE: A total of 502 665 people aged between 40 and 69 were recruited to participate in UK Biobank. Of these, 117 175 took part in baseline assessment of vision, IOP, refraction and keratometry. A subgroup of 67 321 underwent OCT and retinal photography. The introduction of eye and vision measures in UK Biobank was accompanied by intensive training, support and a data monitoring quality control process. FUTURE PLANS: UK Biobank is one of the largest prospective cohorts worldwide with extensive data on ophthalmic diseases and conditions. Data collection is an ongoing process and a repeat of the baseline assessment including the questionnaires, measurements and sample collection will be performed in subsets of 25 000 participants every 2-3 years. The depth and breadth of this dataset, coupled with its open-access policy, will create a powerful resource for all researchers to investigate the eye diseases in later life

Mental health in UK Biobank: development, implementation and results from an online questionnaire completed by 157 366 participants

Background UK Biobank is a well-characterised cohort of over 500 000 participants that offers unique opportunities to investigate multiple diseases and risk factors. Aims An online mental health questionnaire completed by UK Biobank participants was expected to expand the potential for research into mental disorders. Method An expert working group designed the questionnaire, using established measures where possible, and consulting with a patient group regarding acceptability. Case definitions were defined using operational criteria for lifetime depression, mania, anxiety disorder, psychotic-like experiences and self-harm, as well as current post-traumatic stress and alcohol use disorders. Results 157 366 completed online questionnaires were available by August 2017. Comparison of self-reported diagnosed mental disorder with a contemporary study shows a similar prevalence, despite respondents being of higher average socioeconomic status than the general population across a range of indicators. Thirty-five per cent (55 750) of participants had at least one defined syndrome, of which lifetime depression was the most common at 24% (37 434). There was extensive comorbidity among the syndromes. Mental disorders were associated with high neuroticism score, adverse life events and long-term illness; addiction and bipolar affective disorder in particular were associated with measures of deprivation. Conclusions The questionnaire represents a very large mental health survey in itself, and the results presented here show high face validity, although caution is needed owing to selection bias. Built into UK Biobank, these data intersect with other health data to offer unparalleled potential for crosscutting biomedical research involving mental health

Accurate estimation of SNP-heritability from biobank-scale data irrespective of genetic architecture.

SNP-heritability is a fundamental quantity in the study of complex traits. Recent studies have shown that existing methods to estimate genome-wide SNP-heritability can yield biases when their assumptions are violated. While various approaches have been proposed to account for frequency- and linkage disequilibrium (LD)-dependent genetic architectures, it remains unclear which estimates reported in the literature are reliable. Here we show that genome-wide SNP-heritability can be accurately estimated from biobank-scale data irrespective of genetic architecture, without specifying a heritability model or partitioning SNPs by allele frequency and/or LD. We show analytically and through extensive simulations starting from real genotypes (UK Biobank, N = 337 K) that, unlike existing methods, our closed-form estimator is robust across a wide range of architectures. We provide estimates of SNP-heritability for 22 complex traits in the UK Biobank and show that, consistent with our results in simulations, existing biobank-scale methods yield estimates up to 30% different from our theoretically-justified approach