OBJECTIVE To monitor the evolving epidemic of mortality from tobacco in China following the large increase in male cigarette use in recent decades. DESIGN Prospective study of smoking and mortality starting with 224 500 interviewees who should eventually be followed for some decades. SETTING 45 nationally representative small urban or rural areas distributed across China. SUBJECTS Male po...

STUDY OBJECTIVE To compare health walks, a community based lay-led walking scheme versus advice only on physical activity and cardiovascular health status in middle aged adults. DESIGN Randomised controlled trial with one year follow up. Physical activity was measured by questionnaire. Other measures included attitudes to exercise, body mass index, cholesterol, aerobic capacity, and blood pre...

STUDY OBJECTIVE To report the prevalence of physical disability in a national sample of 43 year old men and women, and examine the relationship between disability and the consumption of hospital care. To assess the contribution of childhood health and social circumstances to the risk of adult disability, and the socioeconomic consequences of disability. DESIGN The assessment of disabilities o...

The relationship between speed and crashes has been well established in the literature, with the consequence that speed reduction through enforced or other means should lead to a reduction in crashes. The extent to which the public regard speeding as a problem that requires enforcement is less clear. Analysis was conducted on public perceptions of antisocial behaviors including speeding traffic...

BACKGROUND Cognitive and physical functions are closely linked in old age, but less is known about this association in midlife. Whether cognitive function predicts physical function and whether physical function predicts cognitive function were assessed in middle-aged men and women. METHODS Data were from Whitehall II, an ongoing large-scale, prospective occupational cohort study of employees...

BACKGROUND People who watch a lot of medical fiction overestimate the success rate of cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR). It has been suggested that this is because CPR is usually shown to be successful on television. This study analysed a popular Flemish medical drama series. Previous research showed that heavy viewing of this series was related to overestimation of CPR success. METHOD Cont...

INTRODUCTION Studies in high-income countries suggest that mortality is related to economic cycles, but few studies have examined how fluctuations in the economy influence mortality in low- and middle-income countries. We exploit regional variations in gross domestic product per capita (GDPpc) over the period 1980-2010 in Colombia to examine how changes in economic output relate to adult mortal...

INTRODUCTION Environmental factors can play a role in the pathogenesis of Alzheimer's disease. We present a case of the simultaneous onset of Alzheimer's disease in two middle aged adults. CASE PRESENTATION A married couple ages 54 year and 51-year-old female cohabiting together were diagnosed with Alzheimer's disease within the same year. The patient's both developed cognitive decline shortl...

The author, a physician in late middle age reflects on his own medical career, the aging of those who have taught him and also of those whom he has taught. He describes the sense of ennui and déjà vu. The things that seemed important as a younger doctor seem less important. He has adopted a different paradigm and has come to see that both playfulness and integrity are essential ingredients for ...

OBJECTIVE Psychosocial stress is a suggested risk for coronary heart disease (CHD). The relationship of stress resilience in adolescence with subsequent CHD risk is underinvestigated, so our objective was to assess this and investigate the possible mediating role of physical fitness. METHODS In this register-based study, 237,980 men born between 1952 and 1956 were followed from 1987 to 2010 u...