Genetic risks and genetic model specification.

Genetic risks and genetic models are often used in design and analysis of genetic epidemiology studies. A genetic model is defined in terms of two genetic risk measures: genotype relative risk and odds ratio. The impacts of choosing a risk measure on the resulting genetic models are studied in the power to detect association and deviation from Hardy-Weinberg equilibrium in cases using genetic relative risk. Extensive simulations demonstrate that the power of a study to detect associations using odds ratio is lower than that using relative risk with the same value when other parameters are fixed. When the Hardy-Weinberg equilibrium holds in the general population, the genetic model can be inferred by the deviation from Hardy-Weinberg equilibrium in only cases. Furthermore, it is more efficient than that based on the deviation from Hardy-Weinberg equilibrium in all cases and controls.