Association between telomere length, specific causes of death, and years of healthy life in health, aging, and body composition, a population-based cohort study.
Although telomere length (TL) is known to play a critical role in cellular senescence, the relationship of TL to aging and longevity in humans is not well understood. In a large biracial population-based cohort, we tested the hypotheses that elderly persons with shorter TL in peripheral white blood cells have poorer survival, shorter life span, and fewer years of healthy life (YHL). Associations were evaluated using Cox proportional hazard models and linear regression analyses where appropriate. TL (in kilo base pairs) was not associated with overall survival (hazard ratio 1.0; 95% confidence interval 0.9-1.1) or death from any specific underlying cause including infectious diseases, cancer, or cardiac and cerebrovascular diseases. TL, however, was positively associated with more YHL (beta = 0.08 +/- 0.04, p = .03). Findings suggest that TL may not be a strong biomarker of survival in older individuals, but it may be an informative biomarker of healthy aging.
Departments of Medicine and Institute for Human Genetics, 513 Parnassus Street, HSE 672, University of California, San Francisco, San Francisco, CA 94143-0794, USA.
Omer T
OT
Njajou
Wen-Chi
WC
Hsueh
Elizabeth H
EH
Blackburn
Anne B
AB
Newman
Shih-Hsuan
SH
Wu
Rongling
R
Li
Eleanor M
EM
Simonsick
Tamara M
TM
Harris
Steve R
SR
Cummings
Richard M
RM
Cawthon
D000368:Aged; D000375:Aging; D001823:Body Composition; D002423:Cause of Death; D015331:Cohort Studies; D005260:Female; D006304:Health Status; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D016615:Telomere