title: Familial Risk for Exceptional Longevity.
abstract: One of the most glaring deficiencies in the current assessment of mortality risk is the lack of information concerning the impact of familial longevity. In this work, we update estimates of sibling relative risk of living to extreme ages using data from more than 1,700 sibships, and we begin to examine the trend for heritability for different birth-year cohorts. We also build a network model that can be used to compute the increased chance for exceptional longevity of a subject, conditional on his family history of longevity. The network includes familial longevity from three generations and can be used to understand the effects of paternal and maternal longevity on an individual's chance to live to an extreme age.
authors.affiliation: Department of Biostatistics, Boston University School of Public Health, Boston.
authors.forename: Paola
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Sebastiani
authors.affiliation: New England Centenarian Study, Geriatrics Section, Department of Medicine, Boston Medical Center, Boston University School of Medicine.
authors.forename: Stacy L
authors.initials: SL
authors.lastname: Andersen
authors.affiliation: Department of Biostatistics, Boston University School of Public Health, Boston.
authors.forename: Avery I
authors.initials: AI
authors.lastname: McIntosh
authors.affiliation: Department of Biostatistics, Boston University School of Public Health, Boston.
authors.forename: Lisa
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Nussbaum
authors.affiliation: Department of Biostatistics, Boston University School of Public Health, Boston.
authors.forename: Meredith D
authors.initials: MD
authors.lastname: Stevenson
authors.affiliation: Department of Biostatistics, Boston University School of Public Health, Boston; New England Centenarian Study, Geriatrics Section, Department of Medicine, Boston Medical Center, Boston University School of Medicine.
authors.forename: Leslie
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Pierce
authors.affiliation: Department of Biostatistics, Boston University School of Public Health, Boston; New England Centenarian Study, Geriatrics Section, Department of Medicine, Boston Medical Center, Boston University School of Medicine.
authors.forename: Samantha
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Xia
authors.affiliation: Department of Biostatistics, Boston University School of Public Health, Boston; New England Centenarian Study, Geriatrics Section, Department of Medicine, Boston Medical Center, Boston University School of Medicine.
authors.forename: Kelly
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Salance
authors.affiliation: New England Centenarian Study, Geriatrics Section, Department of Medicine, Boston Medical Center, Boston University School of Medicine.
authors.forename: Thomas T
authors.initials: TT
authors.lastname: Perls