title: Cohort Profile: The National Academy of Sciences-National Research Council Twin Registry (NAS-NRC Twin Registry).
abstract: The National Academy of Sciences-National Research Council Twin Registry (NAS-NRC Twin Registry) is a comprehensive registry of White male twin pairs born in the USA between 1917 and 1927, both of the twins having served in the military. The purpose was medical research and ultimately improved clinical care. The cohort was assembled in the early 1960s with identification of approximately 16,000 twin pairs, review of service records, a brief mailed questionnaire assessing zygosity, and a health survey largely comparable to questionnaires used at that time with Scandinavian twin registries. Subsequent large-scale data collection occurred in 1974, 1985 and 1998, repeating the health survey and including information on education, employment history and earnings. Self-reported data have been supplemented with mortality, disability and medical data through record linkage. Potential collaborators should access the study website [http://www.iom.edu/Activities/Veterans/TwinsStudy.aspx] or e-mail the Medical Follow-up Agency at [Twins@nas.edu]. Questionnaire data are being prepared for future archiving with the National Archive of Computerized Data on Aging (NACDA) at the Inter-University Consortium for Political and Social Research (ICPSR), University of Michigan, MI.
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychology, University of Southern California, Los Angeles, CA, USA, Department of Medical Epidemiology and Biostatistics, Karolinska Institutet, Stockholm, Sweden, gatz@usc.edu.
authors.forename: Margaret
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Gatz
authors.affiliation: Division of Epidemiology, Norwegian Institute of Public Health, Oslo, Norway.
authors.forename: Jennifer R
authors.initials: JR
authors.lastname: Harris
authors.affiliation: Department of Public Health and Institute for Molecular Medicine, University of Helsinki, Helsinki, Finland, National Institute for Health and Welfare, Department of Mental Health and Substance Abuse Services, Helsinki, Finland.
authors.forename: Jaakko
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Kaprio
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychology, University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, MN, USA.
authors.forename: Matt
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: McGue
authors.affiliation: Department of Epidemiology, University of Washington, Seattle, WA, USA, VA Seattle Epidemiologic Research and Information Center, Puget Sound Health Care System, Seattle, WA, USA.
authors.forename: Nicholas L
authors.initials: NL
authors.lastname: Smith
authors.affiliation: Department of Epidemiology, University of Groningen, Groningen, The Netherlands.
authors.forename: Harold
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Snieder
authors.affiliation: Massachusetts Veterans Epidemiology Research and Information Center, VA Boston Healthcare System, Jamaica Plain, MA, USA, Boston University Schools of Public Health and Medicine, Boston, MA, USA and.
authors.forename: Avron
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Spiro
authors.affiliation: Medical Follow-Up Agency, Institute of Medicine, National Academy of Sciences, Washington, DC, USA.
authors.forename: David A
authors.initials: DA
authors.lastname: Butler
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D000369:Aged, 80 and over; D015331:Cohort Studies; D004200:Diseases in Twins / Q000453:epidemiology; D059647:Gene-Environment Interaction; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D009307:National Academy of Sciences, U.S.; D012042:Registries; D011795:Surveys and Questionnaires; D018433:Twin Studies as Topic; D014427:Twins / Q000235:genetics*; D014481:United States; D058014:Veterans Health / Q000208:ethnology*; D044465:White People; D047789:World War II; D055815:Young Adult