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The Nurses’ Health Study is a longitudinal population study aimed initially to examine the relation between the use of oral contraceptives, cigarette smoking, and risk of major illnesses in women, mainly cancer and cardiovascular diseases. Since then, the study broadened to include the evaluation of health consequences of many lifestyle practices, including diet, physical activity, and specific forms of hormone therapy.

The participants are registered nurses, aged 30 to 55 years and married at the time of recruitment in 1976, and who lived in the 11 most populous states (California, Connecticut, Florida, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, New Jersey, New York, Ohio, Pennsylvania and Texas).

The Andhra Pradesh Children and Parent Study (APCAPS) is a large prospective, intergenerational cohort study in Southern India that began with the long-term follow-up of the Hyderabad Nutrition Trial (1987-1990). It is situated in 29 villages near the city of Hyderabad in Ranga Reddy district, Andhra Pradesh.

The Hyderabad Nutrition Trial evaluated the Integrated Child Development Services (ICDS) scheme, a national community outreach program, which provides a daily food supplement to pregnant women and children under 6 years of age. The trial used a controlled stepped wedge design, recruiting pregnant women from 29 villages (15 intervention with program; 14 controls awaiting implementation) and followed them through to childbirth.

In 2003-5, trial households were retraced and surveyed: families with at least one child born during the trial period and still alive in 2003-05 became the APCAPS prospective cohort (1815 families, 2601 index children). At this time, a first wave (W1) of data collection was carried out on index children and their mothers. The index children were then re-examined as young adults (aged 18-23 years) in 2009-10 (the second wave, W2) and then again in 2010-12 (the third wave, W3) when their siblings and parents were also examined. A socio-demographic household survey of all residents in all 29 villages was completed between 2012 and 2014.

ASPREE is a double-blind, randomized, placebo-controlled primary prevention trial designed to assess whether daily active treatment of 100 mg enteric-coated aspirin will extend the duration of disability-free life in healthy participants aged 70 years and above except for Hispanic and African American minority groups in the U.S. where the minimum age of entry is 65 years.

The primary objective is to determine whether low-dose aspirin prolongs life, or life free of dementia, or life free of significant, persistent physical disability in the healthy elderly. Secondary objectives relate to the effects of low-dose aspirin on the key outcome areas of death, cardiovascular disease, dementia and cognitive decline, cancer, physical disability, depression and major bleeding episodes. Variables were collected annually through visits and for the purposes of retention telephone calls were scheduled at set points through the 7 years.

The Chinese Longitudinal Healthy Longevity Study (CLHLS) is a large-scale population-based study on health status and quality of life of the elderly in 23 provinces (out of 31 provinces) of China since 1998 with 8 waves so far. The study covers approximately 85% of the total population of China and was conducted to shed light on the determinants of human healthy longevity. The CLHLS tried to interview all consenting centenarians in the sampled counties and cities. For each centenarian interviewee, compatible nearby un-related elderly and younger participants were interviewed, including about one nonagenarian aged 90-99, one octogenarian aged 80-89, 1.5 young-old adult aged 65-79 and 0.7 middle-aged adult aged 40-64. Detailed longitudinal data on physical and mental health, cognitive function, social participation, etc. at old ages were collected from a total of 96,805 face-to-face interviews with 16,557 centenarians, 23,081 nonagenarians, 25,842 octogenarians, 19,650 younger elders aged 65-79, and 11,675 aged 35-64 in the completed 7 waves from 1998 to 2014. For the 26,701 participants who died between these seven waves, data on mortality and quality of life before death (i.e., degree/length of disability and suffering before death) were collected in interviews with a close family member of the deceased. The completed seven waves of CLHLS had collected DNA samples from 24,693 participants, including 4,849 centenarians, 5,190 nonagenarians, 5,274 octogenarians, 4,770 aged 65-79, and 4,609 aged 40-64. The 8th wave of CLHLS is ongoing and expected to be completed by the end of July 2018.

Since 1993 the EAS has used systematic recruiting methods to assemble a cohort of over 2,200 elderly individuals from the Bronx, 26% of whom are African American. The EAS sample is broadly representative of the elderly population in one of the poorest and most racially and ethnically diverse urban counties in the United States.

The EAS has developed, tested, and applied strategies designed to meet the recruitment and retention challenges that may arise when conducting research studies with older adults. In 2004, the EAS began using the Registered Voter Lists (RVL) for Bronx County for continuous recruitment efforts. Individuals of at least 70 years of age, Bronx residents, non-institutionalized and English speaking are randomly selected from updated RVL and sent a letter followed by a screening telephone call. Persons who complete the telephone screening battery and agree to participate in clinical follow-up are invited to enroll. Continuing enrollment has resulted in over 2200 participants by 2017.

A family-based cohort study that is embedded in the Genetic Research in Isolated Populations (GRIP) program in the South West of the Netherlands. The aim of this program was to identify genetic risk factors in the development of complex disorders. For the ERF study, 22 families that had at least five children baptized in the community church between 1850-1900 were identified with the help of genealogical records. All living descendants of these couples and their spouses were invited to take part in the study. Data collection started in June 2002 and was finished in February 2005 (n=2065).

A population-based prospective study of cerebro-cardiovascular diseases was begun in 1961 in the town of Hisayama, a suburb of the Fukuoka metropolitan area of Kyushu Island in Japan. In addition, comprehensive surveys of cognitive impairment in the elderly of this town have been conducted since 1985. In 1988, a total of 1,228 residents aged ?60 years (91.1% of the total population in this age group) participated in a screening examination for the present study. After exclusion of 33 subjects who had dementia, 90 who had already had breakfast, 5 who were on insulin therapy, and 81 who could not complete the OGTT, a total of 1,019 subjects without dementia underwent the OGTT. From a total of 1,019 subjects, 2 who died before starting follow-up were excluded, and the remaining 1,017 subjects (437 men and 580 women) were enrolled in this study.

The subjects were followed up prospectively for 15 years, from December 1988 to November 2003 (mean 10.9 years; SD 4.1 years).

The Longitudinal Study of Generations (LSOG), initiated in 1971, began as a survey of intergenerational relations among 300 three-generation California families with grandparents (then in their sixties), middle-aged parents (then in their early forties), and grandchildren (then aged 15 to 26). The study broadened in 1991 and now includes a fourth generation, the great-grandchildren of these same families.

The study objectives were:

To track life-course trajectories of family intergenerational solidarity and conflict over three decades of adulthood, and across successive generations of family members;
To identify how intergenerational solidarity and conflict influence the well-being of family members throughout the adult life-course and across successive generations;
To chart the effects of socio-historical change on families, intergenerational relationships, and individual life-course development during the past three decades;
To examine women’s roles and relationships in multigenerational families over 30 years of rapid change in the social trajectories of women’s lives.

Tracking Parkinson’s, or the PRoBaND study, is a UK-based study of Parkinson’s disease funded entirely by Parkinson’s UK.

There is a wide variation of symptoms and features of Parkinson’s driven by both genetic and external factors. Our study aims to define and explain these variations by analysing the clinical expression of Parkinson’s in relation to genotypic variation. Tracking Parkinson’s is a multi-centre prospective longitudinal study, informed by epidemiological and biomarker data.

Participants were recruited into three categories:

Recent onset patients (diagnosed within the last three years) are followed up at 6-month intervals for four years, then every 18-months for a further three years.
Early onset (patients diagnosed before the age of 50) were followed up at one year.
Relatives (siblings) of the participants are followed up after three years.

Since 2012, we have been running at 70 sites across the UK. Recruitment closed in November 2017 and our cohort consists of 2,270 people with Parkinson’s and 344 of their siblings.

NHS Greater Glasgow & Clyde is the study Sponsor and the coordinating study centre is based at the Institute of Neuroscience & Psychology at the University of Glasgow in Scotland.

The Kungsholmen Project is a longitudinal population-based study on ageing and dementia, carried out by the Stockholm Gerontology Research Center in collaboration with Aging Research Center (ARC), Karolinska Institutet.

The project, which started in 1987, has gathered a 12-year long database and offers information on aging from a multidisciplinary perspective. All persons that were born before 1913 and lived in the Kungsholmen district of Stockholm, were invited to participate (a total of 2368 persons on October 1st, 1987, including both community-dwelling and institutionalized persons). Later, the research additionally included all 90+ old subjects living in the St. Göran parish, an adjacent geographical area. The baseline phase and four follow-ups have been completed, with the last phase concluding in the summer of 2000. Time 1 was the only measurement occasion when a two-phase study design was adopted, with an extensive clinical examination performed after a screening phase. At every other occasion, all participants were interviewed by nurses, clinically examined by physicians, and assessed by psychologists.