The Lifelong Health Support 10: a Japanese prescription for a long and healthy life

Abstract

Background Although the age-adjusted incidence and mortality of cancer and cardiovascular disease (CVD) have been decreasing steadily in Japan, both diseases remain major contributors to morbidity and mortality along with the aging society. Herein, we aim to provide a prescription of 10 health tips for long and healthy life named the “Lifelong Health Support 10 (LHS10).” Method The LHS10 was developed by the preventive medicine specialists at the National Cerebral and Cardiovascular Center in Suita, where it has been used for health guidance to prevent CVD, cancer, and cognitive decline in addition to their major risk factors such as hypertension, diabetes, and obesity. It consisted of the lifestyle modification recommendations of the 2014 Japanese Society of Hypertension guidelines and the 2017 Japan Atherosclerosis Society Guidelines for preventing atherosclerotic CVD. Further, it came in line with other international lifestyle modification guidelines. In this narrative review, we summarized the results of several Japanese epidemiological studies investigating the association between the LHS10 items and the risk of cancer, CVD, and other chronic diseases including dementia, diabetes, and chronic kidney disease. Results The LHS10 included avoiding smoking and secondhand smoke exposure, engaging in physical activity, refraining from excessive alcohol drinking, reducing fried foods and sugary soft drinks, cutting salt in food, consuming more vegetables, fruits, fish, soy foods, and fibers, and maintaining proper body weight. All items of the LHS10 were shown to reduce the risk of cancer, CVD, and other chronic diseases. Conclusions The LHS10 can be a helpful tool for health guidance. Supplementary information The online version contains supplementary material available at https://doi.org/10.1265/ehpm.22-00085 .

Association Between White Blood Cell Count and Atrial Fibrillation Risk ― A Population-Based Prospective Cohort Study ―

“…31, 32 Avoiding smoking is a substantial factor in the Lifelong Health Support 10 (LHS10) scheme proposed by the preventive medicine specialists at the NCVC, based on Japanese epidemiological evidence, to prevent CVD, including AF. 33 Notably, the spline curves (Figure ) showed that the linear association between WBC count and AF risk was significantly more prominent among those with WBC levels <3.1 or >8.4×10 9 /L. The Japan Society of Ningen Dock suggested a WBC count between 3.1 and 8.4×10 9 /L as a reference range.…”

Serum cholesterol levels and the risk of brain natriuretic peptide–diagnosed heart failure in postmenopausal women: a population-based prospective cohort study

“…Based on previous literature about HF and CVD risk factors, 29,30 we included the following baseline covariates in the Cox regression models: age (continuous), BMI (<18.5, 18.5-24.9, and ≥25.0 kg/m 2 ), smoking (never, former, or current), alcohol drinking (never, former, moderate [<46 g ethanol/d], or excessive [≥46 g ethanol/d]), hypertension defined as systolic/diastolic blood pressure of 140/90 mm Hg or greater or hypertension medication (yes or no), diabetes defined as fasting blood glucose of 126 mg/dL or greater or diabetes medication (yes or no), cardiac murmurs or valvular disease assessed clinically or using medical records (yes or no), arrhythmia including atrial fibrillation documented by baseline electrocardiogram or medical records (yes or no), history of CVD (stroke and/or ischemic heart disease) (yes or no), chronic kidney disease (CKD) defined as estimated glomerular filtration rate less than 60 mL/min per 1.73 m 2 (yes or no), and lipid-lowering agent use (yes or no). We further adjusted for baseline BNP pg/mL (continuous) and TC (<160, 160-199, 200-239, and ≥240 mg/dL) in separate models.…”

The association between stair climbing and modifiable cardiovascular disease risk factors: the Suita Study

“…Cardiovascular disease (CVD) continues to stand as the primary contributor to morbidity and mortality both in Japan and worldwide [ 1 ]. Yet, the effective management of modifiable risk factors associated with CVD could play a pivotal role in alleviating its burden [ 2 , 3 ].…”

“…Given that 1) modifying CVD risk factors is essential for CVD prevention [ 2 , 3 ], 2) stair climbing is a sort of physical activity with potential health merits [ 4 – 8 ], 3) studies investigating the association between stair climbing and modifiable CVD risk factors are scarce with inconsistent results [ 4 – 8 ], and 4) relevant findings from Asian populations are lacking, we performed this study to investigate the association between stair climbing and several modifiable CVD risk factors in a Japanese sample.…”