Longevity Lecture in Chicago

See also:
What is Aging?   Theories of Aging   Population Aging

Greetings,

We are pleased to announce our upcoming invited lecture on Human Longevity Studies to be held this Tuesday, March 14 in Chicago:

"Predictors of Exceptional Human Longevity"

Power-Point Presentation:

http://longevity-science.org/Chicago-Actuary-2006.ppt

Time:
Tuesday, March 14, 3 pm

Location:
Chicago downtown,
Building of the Blue Cross Blue Shield of Illinois,
300 East Randolph Street, CAL level
NothEast corner of Randolph and Columbus Drive
Chicago, IL 60601

Everybody is cordially invited, but the admission requires a prior registration at the Chicago Actuarial Association at:

http://chicagoactuarialassociation.org/
and
http://home.comcast.net/~chicagoactuarial/Mar06e.pdf

and a picture ID will be also asked at the reception.

Hope to see you soon!

Here is the abstract of our invited lecture:

"This study explores the determinants of exceptional survival to age 100 and beyond. A method of within-family analysis has been applied to investigate the occurrence patterns for centenarians among siblings, which allows researchers to avoid confounding caused by between-family variation. This approach was implemented using conditional logistic regression with a binary outcome variable describing either a centenarian, or non-centenarian survival outcome.

The 198 validated centenarians born in USA in 1890-1893 were identified, and their complete family histories were reconstructed using the US Censuses, the US Social Security Administration database, genealogical records and other supplementary data resources. The following predictor variables were explored: gender, birth order, paternal age at person's birth, maternal age at person's birth, and the season of birth.

The study found that first-born siblings are more likely to become centenarians when compared to later-born siblings (odds ratio = 1.77, 95% CI = 1.18 - 2.66, P = 0.006). This protective effect of first-born status can not be simply explained by differences in child mortality, because it persists when a comparison is made with those siblings only who survived to adulthood (age 20): odds ratio = 1.95, 95% CI = 1.26 - 3.01, P = 0.003. Moreover, even at age 75 it still helps to be a first-born child in order to become a centenarian (odds ratio = 1.66, 95% CI = 1.02 - 2.69, P = 0.04).

In order to understand the mechanism of the birth-order effect, a multivariate analysis with included parental age variables was performed. This multivariate analysis found that the protective effect of being first-born is driven mostly by the young maternal age at person's birth (being born to mother younger than 25 years). Being born to young mother is the major predictor of human longevity (odds ratio = 2.03, 95% CI = 1.33 - 3.11, P = 0.001). Moreover, even at age 75 it still important to be born to young mother in order to survive to 100 years (odds ratio = 1.87, 95% CI = 1.15 -3.05, P = 0.01)."

You are welcome to write your comments here on our abstract and the Power-Point Presentation -- just click on "comment" option below.

http://www.blogger.com/comment.g?blogID=21976565&postID=114211371440135830

Thanks!

Leonid Gavrilov
Website: http://longevity-science.org/
Blog: http://longevity-science.blogspot.com/

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