Early-life conditions and health at older ages: The mediating role of educational attainment, family and employment trajectories

Arpino, Bruno; Gumà, Jordi; Julià, Albert

doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0195320

Cited by 61 publications

(77 citation statements)

References 45 publications

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“…At the same time, our study observed that the population with college degrees or higher had lower CVD morbidity (data not shown), which is consistent with previous studies that have reported that lower education levels may contribute to CVD risk factors 39 . It is possible that more educated subjects may benefit from the increased health knowledge and a healthier life style 40,41 . Regarding hypertension, we found an inverse association between LTL and CVD risk in people without hypertension.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Association between leucocyte telomere length and cardiovascular disease in a large general population in the United States

Wang

et al. 2020

Sci Rep

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Leucocyte telomere length (LTL) has been reported to be linked to ageing, cancer and cardiovascular disease (cVD). this study aimed to explore the association between LtL and cVD risk in a nationally representative sample of U.S. adults. Complex associations, including nonlinearity and interaction, were also examined. A total of 7,378 subjects from the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES) 1999-2002 were collected. Telomere length was detected from DNA samples and expressed as the mean t/S ratio (telomere repeats per single-copy gene). We performed multiple logistic regression models and interactive analysis to explore the associations between LtL and cVD risk by adjusting for potential confounders. We also performed a sensitivity analysis to investigate the robustness of our results. Among all participants, LTL was associated with the risk of CVD (OR = 0.79, 95% CI: 0.63~0.98, P = 0.033) in a linear manner rather than in a nonlinear manner (P = 0.874). Interaction effects of LTL with both education (P = 0.017) and hypertension (P = 0.007) were observed. Furthermore, using subgroup analyses, protective effects of LTL on CVD risk were found in females and in individuals who were college graduates or above, had serum cotinine >10 ng/ml, did not have hypertension, or had normal white blood cell levels. LTL is linearly inversely associated with CVD risk in the general population of the United States. Telomeres are repetitive sequences of nucleotides at the ends of chromosomes that play a role in the maintenance of genic integrity. Telomeres are involved in many physiological processes 1 such as cell senescence 2 and endometrial regeneration 3. Leucocyte telomere length (LTL) is the longest at birth and decreases with age 4. Moreover, the shortening of LTL affects the progression of diseases, including ageing 5,6 , immune dysfunction 7 , post-traumatic stress disorder 8 , diabetes 9 , cardiovascular disease (CVD) 10 , and cancer 5,11. CVD refers to heart and blood vessel abnormalities and is one of the most common causes of noncommunicable disease mortality 12 , accounting for approximately 17.5 million deaths worldwide 13. The United States has the largest number of CVD patients in the world 14. Reportedly, approximately 1,500,000 U.S. adults are affected by CVD each year 15 , and millions of Americans have CVD risk factors 16. Peng et al. found that longer LTL was associated with cardiovascular health (CVH) indices (i.e., a surrogate measure of CVD risk) in American Indians 17. Similarly, Gebreab et al. explored the associations between LTL and CVH and observed similar results in the general U.S. population, especially in females and non-Hispanic whites 18. Another report showed an inverse association between LTL and coronary artery calcification in African Americans 19. A meta-analysis reported an inverse association between LTL and the risk of CVD 10. However, among the general U.S. population, the association between LTL and the risk of CVD remains unclear. In addition, people of different eth...

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Association between leucocyte telomere length and cardiovascular disease in a large general population in the United States

Wang

et al. 2020

Sci Rep

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“…Individuals' socioeconomic status is one of the most important background determinants of fertility and as such can be considered as a distal determinant also for the demography of grandparenthood. In a recent study, Arpino, Gumà, and Julià (2018) found that early-life (e.g., parental socioeconomic background) and childhood conditions (e.g., health) influence fertility and partnership histories through their influence on educational attainment. Therefore, early-life conditions and education may be thought as distal determinants of grandparenthood outcomes because of their indirect effect operating through their influence on family histories.…”

Section: Mechanisms Influencing the Demography Of Grandparenthoodmentioning

confidence: 99%

Family histories and the demography of grandparenthood

Arpino¹,

Gumà²,

Julià³

2018

DemRes

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BACKGROUND Grandparenthood is an important phase of life for many individuals, and the grandparent role has consequences on younger generations and grandparents themselves. OBJECTIVE Despite the importance of the grandparent role, little is known about the demography of grandparenthood. In this study, we examine the variability of demographic aspects of grandparenthood (being a grandparent, number of grandchildren, having at least one young grandchild) according to family (partnership and fertility) histories. METHODS Using retrospective data from the Survey of Health, Ageing and Retirement in Europe (SHARE), we employ sequence and cluster analyses to group individuals according to similar patterns of fertility and partnership histories observed between age 15 and 49. In a second step, we use logistic and Poisson regressions to quantify how demographic aspects of grandparenthood vary across the identified family clusters at different ages and by gender. RESULTS Family histories are greatly heterogeneous with respect to timing, quantum, and probability of experiencing certain events. This heterogeneity is reflected in a strong variability in the probability of having (young) grandchildren and their number at different ages across the clusters of family trajectories. CONTRIBUTION We provide a detailed profile of three demographic characteristics of grandparenthood that significantly influence the opportunity structure for the development of the

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“…Children's happiness and health are known to be important societal values [1,2]. It is generally considered that lifetime health outcomes and socioeconomic status are largely determined by an appropriate and stable environment at the start of life [3].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

School health in Europe: a review of workforce expenditure across five countries

Pol

Postma

Jansen

2020

BMC Health Serv Res

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Background: Most European countries have implemented a form of school health services (SHS) to provide young children and adolescents with various types of healthcare. No estimations on SHS expenditure for European countries have been published until now. We estimated SHS workforce expenditure in Europe, expected to serve as the main driver of school healthcare costs. Methods: Using two networks of experts on healthcare provision for children we contacted various country representatives to provide data on the number of professionals working in SHS and salaries. These data were used, together with publicly available data, to estimate annual SHS workforce expenditure on the national level. Results: We received sufficient data for five European countries, and estimated the SHS workforce expenditure. Nurses were the most widely reported professionals working in this field, followed by doctors and psychologists. Our SHS expenditure estimations ranged from €43,000 for Estonia to €195,300 in Norway (per 1000 pupils). For Norway, Estonia, Finland and Iceland, school nurses were the main drivers of SHS expenditure, mainly due to their large numbers, while in Austria, school doctors played the largest role in SHS expenditure. Conclusions: We estimated the spending on SHS workforce for five European countries, which comprises relatively minor parts of total healthcare spending (0.16 to 0.69%). Many questions regarding SHS spending in Europe remain, due to a general lack of data on national levels.

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Early-life conditions and health at older ages: The mediating role of educational attainment, family and employment trajectories

Cited by 61 publications

References 45 publications

Association between leucocyte telomere length and cardiovascular disease in a large general population in the United States

Association between leucocyte telomere length and cardiovascular disease in a large general population in the United States

Family histories and the demography of grandparenthood

School health in Europe: a review of workforce expenditure across five countries

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