Correlation of Candidate Genetic Variations for Susceptibility and Risk Assessment of Type 2 Diabetes Mellitus and its Related Medical Conditions among Filipinos (DM2)

Various studies have established the role of genetics in the development of type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM) across population groups with a reported heritability of 30–70%. These studies highlight the effect of interethnic variability in genetic susceptibility and risk for complications of T2DM. The underrepresentation of Filipinos in current global databases have prompted the goal to identify variants associated with the risk of T2DM among the population. Since the validation of variants associated with one population seems suboptimal if applied to another population, designing a specific set of genetic variants for a particular population poses a challenge. Microarray techniques were used on extracted DNA from whole blood samples using customized microarray beadchips with selected variants from various genome repositories. Customization included candidates from both coding and non-coding regions (e.g. intergenic and intronic SNPs) with statistical evidence of associated to T2DM, its complications, treatment, diagnosis and other related conditions. Incorporation of clinical data from participants can then narrow the significant variants to the population and identify which can be valuable for developing genetic risk prediction models relevant to preventing and diagnosing the disease among Filipinos.