Determinants of Aging and Health Across the Life Span: Potential New Insights from Longitudinal Studies. Report of the July 2003 Meeting of the NIA Longitudinal Data on Aging Working Group

摘要

Understanding aging requires knowledge of the sequences of events and progressive processes in individuals that affect how they change with age. Longitudinal studies of individuals can provide many insights that cross-sectional comparisons of individuals of differing ages cannot, and resolve uncertainties in the interpretation of cross-sectional data. Considerable longitudinal data in humans have yielded important findings. Nonetheless, there are opportunities to apply longitudinal studies more extensively to a much wider range of aging questions and issues than has occurred thus far. To explore opportunities for this research, the National Institute on Aging has constituted a Longitudinal Data on Aging (LDA) Working Group, consisting of epidemiologic, clinical, and basic researchers with experience and interests in this area.