Associations of Daily Walking Time With Pneumonia Mortality Among Elderly Individuals With or Without a Medical History of Myocardial Infarction or Stroke: Findings From the Japan Collaborative Cohort Study

Background: The association between daily walking and pneumonia mortality, stratified by the presence of disease conditions, such as myocardial infarction (MI) or stroke, was investigated.Methods: The study participants were 22,280 Japanese individuals (9,067 men and 13,213 women) aged 65–79 years. Inverse propensity weighted competing risk model was used to calculate the hazard ratio (HR) and 95% confidence interval (CI) for pneumonia mortality.Results: After a median of 11.9 years of follow-up, 1,203 participants died of pneumonia. Participants who did not have a history of MI or stroke and who walked for 1 hour/day or more were less likely to die from pneumonia (HR 0.90; 95% CI, 0.82–0.98) than those walked for 0.5 hours/day. A similar inverse association of pneumonia and walking (0.5 hours/day) was observed among participants with a history of MI (HR 0.66; 95% CI, 0.48–0.90). Among the participants with a history of stroke, those who walked for 0.6–0.9 hours/day were less likely to die because of pneumonia (HR 0.65; 95% CI, 0.43–0.98).Conclusions: Regular walking for ≥1 hour/day may reduce the risk of pneumonia mortality in elderly individuals with or without cardiovascular disease history

Passive smoking and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease mortality: findings from the Japan collaborative cohort study.

OBJECTIVES:To elucidate the association between passive smoking at home and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) mortality via a large-scale nationwide cohort study in Japan.METHODS:Never smokers (n = 34,604) aged 40-79 years at baseline (1988-1990; 4884 men, 29,720 women) were included in the analysis. Passive smoking at home was measured based on self-reported frequency of weekly exposure to passive smoking at home. An inverse probability of treatment-weighted competing risk model was used to calculate the hazard ratio (HR) and 95% confidence interval (CI) for COPD mortality.RESULTS:During a median follow-up of 16.4 years, 33 participants (10 men, 23 women) died of COPD. The HR for participants exposed to passive smoking at home ≤4 days per week or those who had almost daily exposure to passive smoking at home had a significantly increased risk of COPD mortality (HR 2.40, 95% CI 1.39-4.15, HR 2.88, 95% CI 1.68-4.93, respectively)

Analysis of Serum Fatty Acids and Vitamin D with Dimension Reduction Methods

Fatty acid plays an important role in human health and fat-related diseases. A comprehensive analysis of diverse fatty acids in serum naturally results in a multi-variable, high-dimensional dataset, and, therefore, multivariate analysis, especially dimension reduction, should be considered to extract useful information. In this study, three basic dimension reduction methods including factor analysis, principal component analysis, and independent component analysis were conducted on total and free fatty acid datasets in a general Japanese population (N=545; men:women=245:300). These analyses successfully characterized fatty acid datasets, reflecting their physicochemical natures, metabolisms, and food sources. Factor analysis and principal component demonstrated the association of -3 fatty acids (20:5 and 22:6) with 25-hydroxyvitamin D3 (vitamin D), suggesting fish oil as their common source of vitamin D. We conclude that dimension reductions can serve as a useful tool to extract valuable information from complex datasets of fatty acids and vitamin D in the aspect of health care and disease control

Preventive home visit program for older people

In Japan, the number of older people who need long-term care is rapidly increasing. However, effective prevention strategies for long term care have not been fully established. To support independent living in a community, we made a home visit program for older people with Shinhidaka and Hidaka town in Hokkaido. Two hundred fifty two participants aged 65 years or older living at home were randomly assigned to an intervention (receive a 60-min home visit program once a month for 3 times) or a control group. Qualified medical care personnel such as public health nurses was in charge of the interventions. After the study period, cognitive function was better in the intervention group than in the control group. In conclusion, our home visit program will be beneficial to sustain community health care and support for older people.Category 2: Quality of Lif

Clinical and histopathological characteristics of patients with prostate cancer in the BioBank Japan project

Background: Prostate cancer is the sixth leading cause of cancer-related deaths in Japan. We aimed to elucidate the clinical and histopathological characteristics of patients with prostate cancer in the BioBank Japan (BBJ) project. Methods: Four thousand, seven hundred and ninety-three patients diagnosed with prostate cancer in the BBJ project were included. Clinical and histopathological data, including causes of death, were analyzed. Relative survival (RS) rates of prostate cancer were calculated. Results: Four thousand, one hundred and seventy-one prostate cancer patients with available histological data had adenocarcinoma. The mean age of the patients was 72.5 years. The proportion of patients who were non-smokers, non-drinkers, had a normal body mass index, did not exercise, had a normal prostate-specific antigen level, and had a family history of prostate cancer were 30.7%, 28.0%, 66.6%, 58.1%, 67.6%, and 6.5%, respectively. The proportion of patients with Stage II, III, and IV disease were 24.4%, 7.3%, and 4.4%, respectively. After limiting to patients with a time from the initial diagnosis of prostate cancer to entry into the study cohort of ≤90 days (n = 869), the 5- and 10-year RS rates were 96.3% and 100.5%, respectively, although we were unable to consider management strategies due to a plenty of data missing. Conclusions: We provide an overview of patients with prostate cancer in the BBJ project. Our findings, coupled with those from various high throughput “omics” technologies, will contribute to the implementation of prevention interventions and medical management of prostate cancer patients

Characteristics of patients with liver cancer in the BioBank Japan project

Background: Liver cancer is the fifth cause of cancer-related deaths in Japan. The BioBank Japan (BBJ) project included 200,000 patients with 47 diseases and samples; their clinical information can be used for further studies. Methods: Patients diagnosed with liver cancer (n = 1733; 1316 men, 417 women) were included. Histology, patient characteristics, clinical characteristics, and causes of death were collected. Cumulative and relative survival rates for liver cancer were calculated. Results: Of the 1354 patients with available liver cancer histology, 91.9% had hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC). Compared with the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey, greater proportions of the male patients in this cohort were daily alcohol consumers (26%), and a greater proportion of the men was overweight/obesity (22%). Although Japan is the only Asian country with a predominance of hepatitis C virus (HCV)-related HCC, the prevalence of HCV infection (44%) was lower than that in a previous study. The 3-, 5-, and 10-year cumulative survival rates were 57%, 47%, and 25% in men, respectively, and 49%, 41%, and 27% in women, respectively. Conclusions: The present results provide an overview of the patients with liver cancer in the BBJ project. We are planning further analyses combined with various high-throughput ‘omics’ technologies

Associations of daily walking and television viewing time with liver cancer mortality : findings from the Japan Collaborative Cohort Study

Several studies have suggested that daily vigorous physical activity reduces the risk of liver cancer, whereas sedentary behavior increases the risk of several cancers. However, the link between liver cancer and low-intensity physical activity (walking) and sedentary behavior is unclear. Therefore, we explored the links between liver cancer mortality and daily walking time/television (TV) viewing time in Japanese adults aged 40-79 years in a large-scale nationwide cohort study. We excluded participants with a history of liver disease, cancer, stroke, or myocardial infarction at baseline (1988-1990) and those who died within the first 5 years of follow-up. A total of 69,752 adults (28,642 men and 41,110 women) were enrolled and followed for a median of 19.4 years. The Cox proportional hazards model was used to calculate hazard ratios (HRs) and 95 % confidence intervals (CI) for liver cancer mortality adjusted for age, sex, and other possible confounding factors. During the study period, 267 participants died of liver cancer. The HRs of participants who walked for > 0.5 h/day and watched TV for 2-4 versus 4 h/day. Our findings suggest that longer walking times and shorter TV viewing times may reduce the risk of liver cancer

Relationship of general trust with individual health and life related factors among frail elderly residents at home in Hokkaido rural areas in Japan

General Trust (GT), defined as a default expectation of other people’s trustworthiness, is assumed to be a predictor for promotion of health and welfare in individuals as well as for strengthening of social capital in the community. An improvement of health and quality of life of the elderly is recently a crucial agenda. Thus, the purpose of the study was to explore which factors regarding health and life associated with GT among frail elderly people living at homes in Japanese rural area. The study selected the subjects who were designated within three mildest degrees in seven stages of long-term care levels and who met at an item and more in the national basic check-list. 209 participants were interviewed by trained health personnel using a structured questionnaire. GT was measured by a dichotomous outcome of inquiring “do you trust people in general?”. In the univariable analysis, educational status (p = 0.004), activity competence index including instrumental activity of daily living (IADL) (p = 0.020), Mini-Mental State Examination (MMSE) (p = 0.029) and Self-rating Depression Scale (SDS) (p = 0.010) were significantly related to GT. By logistic regression analysis using a stepwise method with a likelihood ratio, educational status alone was significantly associate with GT (p = 0.010, odds ratio = 1.195 [95% confidence interval; 1.043 - 1.371]). Health related factors had nothing to do with GT. Our finding suggested that the higher educated elderly might have had more opportunities to encounter the others and more indispensability to deliberately discern their trustworthiness than the lower, and consequently had higher GT through social intelligence being strengthened

Ikeno T. Relationship of general trust with individual related factors among frail elderly residents at home

ABSTRACT General Trust (GT), defined as a default expectation of other people's trustworthiness, is assumed to be a predictor for promotion of health and welfare in individuals as well as for strengthening of social capital in the community. An improvement of health and quality of life of the elderly is recently a crucial agenda. Thus, the purpose of the study was to explore which factors regarding health and life associated with GT among frail elderly people living at homes in Japanese rural area. The study selected the subjects who were designated within three mildest degrees in seven stages of long-term care levels and who met at an item and more in the national basic check-list. 209 participants were interviewed by trained health personnel using a structured questionnaire. GT was measured by a dichotomous outcome of inquiring "do you trust people in general?". In the univariable analysis, educational status (p = 0.004), activity competence index including instrumental activity of daily living (IADL) (p = 0.020), Mini-Mental State Examination (MMSE) (p = 0.029) and Self-rating Depression Scale (SDS) (p = 0.010) were significantly related to GT. By logistic regression analysis using a stepwise method with a likelihood ratio, educational status alone was significantly associate with GT (p = 0.010, odds ratio = 1.195 [95% confidence interval; 1.043 -1.371]). Health related factors had nothing to do with GT. Our finding suggested that the higher educated elderly might have had more opportunities to encounter the others and more indispensability to deliberately discern their trustworthiness than the lower, and consequently had higher GT through social intelligence being strengthened