EC Psychology and Psychiatry

Polygenic risk score (PRS) is a powerful tool for studying the genetic architecture of complex diseases, including psychiatric disorders. This review highlights the use of PRS in psychiatric genetics, including its application in identifying high-risk individuals, estimating heritability, assessing shared etiology between phenotypes, and personalizing treatment plans. It also explains the methodology for calculating PRS, the challenges associated with their use in clinical settings, and future research directions. The main limitation of PRS is that the current models only account for a small fraction of the heritability of psychiatric disorders. Despite this limitation, PRS represents a valuable tool that has already yielded important insights into the genetic architecture of psychiatric disorders.

Keywords: Polygenic Risk Score; Psychiatric Genetics; Risk Assessment; Shared Etiology; Pleiotropy

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