Objective To investigate the associations of childhood IQ and adult social factors, and smoking behaviour, lung function (forced expiratory volume in one second; FEV1), and smoking‐related outcomes ...in adulthood.
Design Retrospective cohort study.
Method Participants were from the Midspan prospective studies conducted on Scottish adults in the 1970s. The sample consisted of 938 Midspan participants born in 1921 who were successfully matched with their cognitive ability test results on the Scottish Mental Survey 1932.
Results Structural equation modelling showed that age 11 IQ was not directly associated with smoking consumption, but that IQ and adult social class had indirect effects on smoking consumption via deprivation category. The influence of IQ on FEV1 was partly indirect via social class. Gender influenced smoking consumption and also IQ and social class. There was a 21% higher risk of having a smoking‐related hospital admission, cancer, or death during 25 years of follow‐up for each standard deviation disadvantage in IQ. Adjustment for adult social class, deprivation category, and smoking reduced the association to 10%.
Conclusion Childhood IQ was associated with social factors which influenced lung function in adulthood, but was not associated directly with smoking consumption. In future studies, it is important to consider other pathways which may account for variance in the link between childhood IQ and health in later life.
The mortality of 3783 non-malignant hypertensive patients attending the Glasgow Blood Pressure Clinic between 1968 and 1983 and followed for an average of 6.5 years was compared with that in three ...control groups: the general population of Strathclyde a group of 15 422 subjects aged 45-64 years and screened in Renfrew and Paisley between 1972 and 1976, and a group of hypertensives seen in a blood pressure clinic based on general practice in Renfrew. Average blood pressure for men at entry to the Glasgow Clinic was 181/111 mmHg falling to 158/96 mmHg during treatment. Corresponding values for women were 185/109 mmHg and 161/96 mmHg. Seven hundred and fifty clinic patients (451 males) died during follow-up, the commonest causes of death in both sexes being myocardial infarction and stroke. All-cause age-adjusted mortality (deaths per 1000 patient-years) was 41.4 for men and 22.1 for women. At all ages in both sexes and for all levels of initial blood pressure mortality was less in patients whose blood pressure was reduced most. Without a randomized control group it is not certain that lower mortality in those with well controlled blood pressure was due to treatment, although this is the most likely explanation. Cigarette smoking, a history of myocardial infarction, angina or stroke, retinal arterio-venous nipping, raised blood urea, an abnormal electrocardiogram (ECG) and secondary hypertension were associated with increased risk, but heavy alcohol intake, obesity, haematocrit greater than 45%, hypokalaemia and social class were not. Life table analysis showed that, despite some reduction of mortality by treatment, the relative risk to men and women in the clinic remained two- to five-times that of the general population. The benefits of treatment were not such as to restore normal expectation of life even when blood pressure was well controlled. Excess mortality in the clinic could not be explained by difference of smoking habit or social class. This suggests that there is in the hypertensive patients of the Glasgow Clinic an element of irreducible risk, that treatment may be beneficial in some respects but harmful in others, or that patients at particularly high risk are selectively referred to the clinic.
Detached spikes from soft white winter wheat (
Triticum aestivum L.) cultivars that produce caryopses with high dormancy levels (Brevor) or low dormancy levels (Greer) were cultured from anthesis in ...basal media and media amended with fluridone or fluridone plus ABA. Effects of fluridone and exogenous ABA on kernel development and dormancy acquisition and maintenance were assessed by measuring fresh and dry mass of embryos and caryopses, ABA content in embryos and caryopses, and kernel post-desiccation dormancy levels. Caryopses and embryos exposed to fluridone accumulated very little ABA. Detached spike culture increased ABA concentration and reduced fresh and dry mass in both caryopses and embryos. Fluridone did not affect fresh and dry mass. Addition of ABA to culture media slightly reduced media uptake by detached spikes. During desiccation, ABA and dry matter decreased in caryopses whereas embryos continued to accumulate both. After 2d, 95 % of Greer kernels exposed to fluridone germinated while only 80 % of Brevor kernels were germinated after 4 d. Culture of detached spikes in media amended with fluridone and ABA induced higher dormancy levels in Brevor than in Greer. Results from this study support the hypothesis that ABA may be involved in acquisition of dormancy as well as maintenance of dormancy in wheat kernels.
Small subunit (16S-like) ribosomal RNA sequences were obtained from representatives of all four families constituting the order Trichomonadida. Comparative sequence analysis revealed that the ...Trichomonadida are a monophyletic lineage and a deep branch of the eukaryotic tree. Relative to the early divergent eukaryotic assemblages the branching pattern within the Trichomonadida is very shallow. This pattern suggests the Trichomonadida radiated recently, perhaps in conjunction with their animal hosts. From a morphological perspective the Devescovinidae and Calonymphidae are considered more derived than the Monocercomonadidae and Trichomonadidae. Molecular trees inferred by distance, parsimony and likelihood techniques consistently show the Devescovinidae and Calonymphidae are the earliest diverging lineages within the Trichomonadida, however bootstrap values do not strongly support a particular branching order. In an analysis of all known 16S-like ribosomal RNA sequences, the Trichomonadida share most recent common ancestry with unidentified protists from the hindgut of the termite Reticulitermes flavipes. The position of two putative free-living trichomonads in the tree is indicative of derivation from symbionts rather than direct descent from some free-living ancestral trichomonad.
Relationships between cardiovascular disease (CVD) mortality and breathlessness, a definition of chronic bronchitis, and pulmonary function are investigated among men in two employed populations ...(17,717 London civil servants and 4904 Scottish workers) and in two communities (844 men in Tecumseh, Michigan and 6859 men in Renfrew and Paisley Burghs, Scotland). Men are aged 40-64 years at entry in all studies except Renfrew-Paisley, where they are aged 45-64 years. Length of follow-up ranges from 6 to 16 years. Age and smoking habits were controlled for in all analyses. Chronic phlegm production is not significantly associated with CVD mortality, and 'chronic bronchitis' is significantly associated with mortality only in the employed populations. Low FEV1 is significantly associated with CVD mortality only in the Whitehall study; however, the rate ratios are above one in all studies. Breathlessness is significantly associated with CVD mortality in all studies. These associations between CVD mortality and 'chronic bronchitis', low FEV1, and breathlessness persist after also controlling for employment grade, systolic blood pressure, antihypertensive medication, ECG changes, plasma cholesterol level, body mass index and diabetes. Only the associations between breathlessness and mortality persist after further controlling for low FEV1 and myocardial ischaemia. The rate ratios between breathlessness and mortality are about two for all studies. It is concluded that in these populations, breathlessness is an independent and major predictor of CVD mortality.
Background.In 1991, soil pollution was found around the site of a former chromium-processing factory in Glasgow, Scotland. Levels of chromium in soil were above limits considered as safe, although a ...risk assessment concluded that population exposure was likely to be below occupational levels. As an excess incidence of leukaemia has been suspected in the area, it was decided to investigate a possible relationship between the pollutant and the illness. Method.The ensuing study was descriptive-geographical. In the absence of better data, levels of exposure were assumed to decrease with distance from the centre of the polluted area. Leukaemia and population figures were obtained for each of nine concentric rings by aggregation of data available at the Enumeration District level. The null study hypothesis was that relative risk (as measured by Poisson regression) would not follow a definite trend with distance from the centre. Sex, age and levels of deprivation were taken into account. Results.Relative risks by variables other than distance followed previously known patterns for leukaemia. No evident pattern by distance was found. After regroupings inside the variables, a significant excess of leukaemia was found for intermediate distances from the pollutant. Conclusion.No evidence was found of a possible relationship between soil pollution by chromium and leukaemia in the general population. Nonetheless, the excess noticed by the study warrants further research.
The question whether there is a level of diastolic pressure during treatment below which further reduction of pressure may be harmful rather than beneficial is of great interest. If, as the ...proponents of this hypothesis maintain, death from CHD among treated hypertensives becomes more rather than less common at very low diastolic pressure, this might explain at least in part why most primary prevention trials of hypertension have failed to show a reduction in CHD mortality. However, as the sceptics have pointed out, the evidence that drug induced lowering of blood pressure is harmful is not of the highest quality, and alternative explanations for excess cardiovascular mortality at low diastolic pressure exist. In the following review of this hotly contested debate it is concluded that both proponents and sceptics may be correct, but that the presence of a J curve should not divert attention from the main benefit of treating hypertension which is a reduction in the risk of fatal and non fatal stroke.
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