Studies consistently show that increasing levels of socioeconomic status (SES) and having a familial history of longevity reduce the risk of mortality. But do these two variables interact, such that individuals with lower levels of SES, for example, may experience an attenuated longevity penalty by virtue of having long-lived relatives? This article examines this interaction by analysing surviv...

BACKGROUND Month of birth--an indicator for a variety of prenatal and early postnatal exposures--has been associated with life expectancy in adulthood. On the northern hemisphere, people born in the autumn live longer than those born during the spring. Only one study has followed a population longitudinally and no study has investigated the relation between month of birth and mortality risk bel...

BACKGROUND The high prevalence of disease and associated weight loss at older ages limits the validity of prospective cohort studies examining the association between body mass index (BMI) and mortality. METHODS I examined mortality associated with excess weight using maximum BMI-a measure that is robust to confounding by illness-induced weight loss. Analyses were carried out on US never-smok...

BACKGROUND Evaluation of antiretroviral treatment (ART) programmes in sub-Saharan Africa is difficult because many patients are lost to follow-up. Outcomes in these patients are generally unknown but studies tracing patients have shown mortality to be high. We adjusted programme-level mortality in the first year of antiretroviral treatment (ART) for excess mortality in patients lost to follow-u...

Several studies have shown excess risk for a number of comorbidities in patients with psoriasis compared with the general population, but data on cause-specific mortality in this patient population are limited. The aim of this study was to estimate the associations of psoriasis and 12 specific causes of death and all-cause mortality in patients with mild and severe psoriasis. The study was base...

Following the increasing demand of coal for power generation, activity concentrations of primordial radionuclides were determined in Nigerian coal using the gamma spectrometric technique with the aim of evaluating the radiological implications of coal utilization and exploitation in the country. Mean activity concentrations of 226Ra, 232Th, and 40K were 8.18±0.3, 6.97±0.3, and 27.38±0.8 Bq kg-1...

the territory of serbia is vulnerable to various types of natural hazards and the risk is not equal across the entire territory; it varies depending on the type of hazard and the expected potential for damage. the first aim of this research was to determine the geographical distributions of the major types of natural hazards. seismic hazards, landslides, rock falls, floods, torrential floods...

BACKGROUND This study investigated whether differences in quality of medical care might explain a portion of the excess mortality associated with mental disorders in the year after myocardial infarction. METHODS This study examined a national cohort of 88 241 Medicare patients 65 years and older who were hospitalized for clinically confirmed acute myocardial infarction. Proportional hazard mo...

BACKGROUND A higher resting heart rate is associated with an increased probability of cardiovascular complications and premature death in patients with type 2 diabetes mellitus. The impact of heart rate on the risk of developing microvascular complications, such as diabetic retinopathy and nephropathy, is, however, unknown. The present study tests the hypothesis that a higher resting heart rate...