{"title":"Beyond the Map: A Multifaceted Approach to Understanding the Lifecourse Impacts of Spatial Exposures on Health.","authors":"Sudirham Sudirham","doi":"10.1093/aje/kwae415","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1093/aje/kwae415","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":7472,"journal":{"name":"American journal of epidemiology","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":5.0,"publicationDate":"2024-10-24","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"142492830","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"医学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Leah Abrams, Nora Brower, Mikko Myrskylä, Neil Mehta
{"title":"Pervasive Stagnation: Flat and Rising Cardiovascular Disease Mortality Post-2010 Across US States and Counties.","authors":"Leah Abrams, Nora Brower, Mikko Myrskylä, Neil Mehta","doi":"10.1093/aje/kwae414","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1093/aje/kwae414","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>Since 2010, the U.S. has experienced adverse trends in cardiovascular disease (CVD) mortality, which dramatically slowed long-standing life expectancy improvements. The extent to which the national trend in CVD mortality masks heterogeneity in trends across states and counties is poorly understood. We provide a detailed accounting of post-2010 trends in CVD mortality by U.S. state and county to understand how features of place relate to trends. We compare trends during 2010-2019 to that of 2000-2009. We observe flattening declines in CVD mortality in nearly every state at both midlife (ages 40-64) and old age (ages 65-84) across the two decades. Many states exhibited increases in midlife CVD mortality in 2010-2019. Old age CVD mortality was still declining in most states post-2010, although much slower compared to the previous decade. States in the Southeast recorded some of the fastest post-2010 declines in CVD mortality at old age. County-level median household income was associated with level of CVD mortality, but all income deciles, even the wealthiest counties, experienced stagnating CVD mortality declines. Findings highlight the ubiquitous nature of CVD stagnation, pointing to the need to identify risk factor affecting trends across regions and socioeconomic strata across the United States.</p>","PeriodicalId":7472,"journal":{"name":"American journal of epidemiology","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":5.0,"publicationDate":"2024-10-24","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"142492833","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"医学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Marnie Downes, Meredith O'Connor, Craig A Olsson, David Burgner, Sharon Goldfeld, Elizabeth A Spry, George Patton, Margarita Moreno-Betancur
{"title":"Causal inference in multi-cohort studies using the target trial framework to identify and minimize sources of bias.","authors":"Marnie Downes, Meredith O'Connor, Craig A Olsson, David Burgner, Sharon Goldfeld, Elizabeth A Spry, George Patton, Margarita Moreno-Betancur","doi":"10.1093/aje/kwae405","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1093/aje/kwae405","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>Longitudinal cohort studies, which follow a group of individuals over time, provide the opportunity to examine causal effects of complex exposures on long-term health outcomes. Utilizing data from multiple cohorts has the potential to add further benefit by improving precision of estimates through data pooling and by allowing examination of effect heterogeneity through replication of analyses across cohorts. However, the interpretation of findings can be complicated by biases that may be compounded when pooling data, or, contribute to discrepant findings when analyses are replicated. The \"target trial\" is a powerful tool for guiding causal inference in single-cohort studies. Here we extend this conceptual framework to address the specific challenges that can arise in the multi-cohort setting. By representing a clear definition of the target estimand, the target trial provides a central point of reference against which biases arising in each cohort and from data pooling can be systematically assessed. Consequently, analyses can be designed to reduce these biases and the resulting findings appropriately interpreted in light of potential remaining biases. We use a case study to demonstrate the framework and its potential to strengthen causal inference in multi-cohort studies through improved analysis design and clarity in the interpretation of findings. Special Collection: N/A.</p>","PeriodicalId":7472,"journal":{"name":"American journal of epidemiology","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":5.0,"publicationDate":"2024-10-23","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"142492831","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"医学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Oludamilola Akinmolayemi, Yifei Sun, Robyn L McClelland, Michael P Bancks, Wendy S Post, Moyses Szklo, Wenshan Qu, Susan R Heckbert, Steven Shea
{"title":"Racial Disparities in Incident and Recurrent Cardiovascular Events: The Multi-Ethnic Study of Atherosclerosis.","authors":"Oludamilola Akinmolayemi, Yifei Sun, Robyn L McClelland, Michael P Bancks, Wendy S Post, Moyses Szklo, Wenshan Qu, Susan R Heckbert, Steven Shea","doi":"10.1093/aje/kwae399","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1093/aje/kwae399","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>Most prior studies of cardiovascular (CVD) events have focused on incident events. We analyzed differences by race/ethnicity in incident and recurrent CVD events in the Multi-Ethnic Study of Atherosclerosis from baseline in 2000-2002 through 2019 using joint and multivariable adjusted Cox proportional hazards modeling. Among 6,814 men and women aged 45-85 years without known CVD at enrollment, during median follow up of 17.7 years, 1206 incident and 695 recurrent CVD events were observed; 891 individuals with a non-fatal incident event were at risk for recurrent events. Rates of combined incident and recurrent CVD events among Black, White, Chinese, and Hispanic participants were 16.8, 18.6, 13.3, and 19.3 per 1000 person-years, respectively. First recurrent CVD event rates in Black, White, Chinese, and Hispanic participants were 87.7, 68.7, 78.1, and 80.7 per 1000 person-years, respectively. Revascularization rates were lower in Black versus White participants (3.8 vs 6.4 per 1000 person-years, p<0.0001). Adjusted hazard for CVD mortality was higher for Black vs. White participants (hazard ratio 1.85; 95% CI: 1.03, 3.29). In this multi-ethnic cohort, Black participants had a lower or similar rate of incident and recurrent CVD events, lower rate of revascularization, and higher rate of fatal CVD compared to White participants.</p>","PeriodicalId":7472,"journal":{"name":"American journal of epidemiology","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":5.0,"publicationDate":"2024-10-23","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"142492834","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"医学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Sensitivity Analysis for Attributable Fraction in the Presence of Unmeasured Confounding.","authors":"Hyunman Sim, An-Shun Tai, Whanhee Lee, Woojoo Lee","doi":"10.1093/aje/kwae409","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1093/aje/kwae409","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>A main goal of epidemiology is to provide an impact of an exposure on health outcomes. The attributable fraction (AF) is a widely used measure for quantifying its contribution. Various methods have been developed to estimate AF, including standardization, inverse probability of treatment weighting, and doubly robust methods. However, the validity of these methods is established based on the conditional exchangeability assumption, which cannot be tested using only observed data. To assess how vulnerable the research findings are to departures from this assumption, researchers need to conduct a sensitivity analysis. In this study, we propose novel sensitivity analysis methods for AF. Sensitivity analysis problems are formulated as optimization problems, and analytic solutions for the problem are derived. We illustrate our proposed sensitivity analysis methods with a publicly available dataset and examine how the AF of the mother's smoking status during pregnancy for low birth weight changes to the degree of unmeasured confounding.</p>","PeriodicalId":7472,"journal":{"name":"American journal of epidemiology","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":5.0,"publicationDate":"2024-10-23","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"142492835","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"医学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Wenxin Lu, Sally Picciotto, Sadie Costello, Hilary Colbeth, Ellen Eisen
{"title":"Evaluating Natural Course Performance in Parametric G-formula: Review of Current Practice and Illustration Based on the United Autoworkers-General Motors Cohort.","authors":"Wenxin Lu, Sally Picciotto, Sadie Costello, Hilary Colbeth, Ellen Eisen","doi":"10.1093/aje/kwae410","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1093/aje/kwae410","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>The parametric g-formula is a causal inference method that appropriately adjusts for time-varying confounding affected by prior exposure. Like all parametric methods, it assumes correct model specification, usually assessed by comparing the observed outcome with the simulated outcome under no intervention (natural course). However, it is unclear how to evaluate natural course performance and whether other variables should also be considered. We reviewed current practices for evaluating model misspecification in applications of parametric g-formula. To illustrate the pitfalls of current practices, we then applied the parametric g-formula to examine cardiovascular disease mortality in relation to occupational exposure in the United Autoworkers-General Motors cohort (UAW-GM), comparing 20 parametric model sets and qualitatively assessing natural course performance for all time-varying variables over follow-up. We found that current practices of evaluating model misspecification are often insufficient, increasing risk of bias and statistical cherry picking. Based on our motivational analyses of the UAW-GM cohort, good natural course performance of the outcome does not guarantee good simulations of other covariates; poor predictions of exposures and covariates may still exist. We recommend reporting natural course performance for all time-varying variables at all time-points. Objective criteria for evaluating model misspecification in parametric g-formula need to be developed.</p>","PeriodicalId":7472,"journal":{"name":"American journal of epidemiology","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":5.0,"publicationDate":"2024-10-23","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"142492832","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"医学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Periconceptional omega-6 and omega-3 polyunsaturated fatty acid intake plane and postpartum depression: a nationwide birth cohort-the Japan Environment and Children's Study.","authors":"Kenta Matsumura, Kei Hamazaki, Akiko Tsuchida, Hidekuni Inadera","doi":"10.1093/aje/kwae403","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1093/aje/kwae403","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>Intake of omega-3 polyunsaturated fatty acids (PUFAs) has favorable effects on the prevention of postpartum depression, but fish, the principal source of omega-3 PUFAs, are becoming a depleted resource. We therefore examined whether lower periconceptional intake of omega-6 PUFAs, whose metabolic pathways are antagonistic to those of omega-3 PUFAs, is associated with lower prevalence of postpartum depression while simultaneously considering omega-3 PUFA intake. The participants were 92,595 mothers involved in the ongoing Japan Environment and Children's Study. Periconceptional intakes of omega-6 and -3 PUFA were measured using a food frequency questionnaire. Postpartum depression was assessed using the Edinburgh Postnatal Depression Scale. Generalized additive mixed model analysis was used to draw contour plots of postpartum depression on a plane with omega-6 and omega-3 PUFA intakes on the x- and y-axes, respectively. The adjusted prevalence ranged from 11.0% to 26.3% within the respective 1st to 99th percentile intake ranges and monotonously decreased with decreasing omega-6 PUFA intake. In contrast, the prevalence decreased with increasing omega-3 PUFA intake, but the trend almost disappeared above 2 g/day. Our results highlight the potential importance of focusing on omega-6 PUFAs as well as omega-3 PUFAs prior to conception to reduce postpartum depression.</p>","PeriodicalId":7472,"journal":{"name":"American journal of epidemiology","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":5.0,"publicationDate":"2024-10-17","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"142455846","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"医学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Guzhengyue Zheng, Shanshan Ran, Jingyi Zhang, Zhengmin Min Qian, Fei Tian, Hui Shi, Michael Elliott, Maya Tabet, Yin Yang, Hualiang Lin
{"title":"Characterizing metabolomic signatures related to coffee and tea consumption and their association with incidence and dynamic progression of type 2 diabetes: A multi-state analysis.","authors":"Guzhengyue Zheng, Shanshan Ran, Jingyi Zhang, Zhengmin Min Qian, Fei Tian, Hui Shi, Michael Elliott, Maya Tabet, Yin Yang, Hualiang Lin","doi":"10.1093/aje/kwae400","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1093/aje/kwae400","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>Our study aimed to investigate the impact of tea and coffee consumption and related metabolomic signatures on dynamic transitions from diabetes-free status to incident type 2 diabetes (T2D), and subsequently to T2D-related complications and death. We included 438,970 participants in the UK Biobank who were free of diabetes and diabetes complications at baseline. Of these, 212,146 individuals had information on all metabolic biomarkers. We identified tea- and coffee-related metabolomic signatures using elastic net regression models. We examined associations of tea and coffee intake and related metabolomic signatures with the onset and progression of T2D using multi-state regression models. We observed that tea and coffee consumption and related metabolomic signatures were inversely associated with the risk of five T2D transitions. For example, HRs (95% CIs) per SD increase of the tea-related metabolomic signature were 0.87 (0.85, 0.89), 0.97 (0.95, 0.99), 0.91 (0.90, 0.92), 0.92 (0.91, 0.94), and 0.91 (0.90, 0.92) for transitions from diabetes-free state to incident T2D, from diabetes-free state to total death, from incident T2D to T2D complications, from incident T2D to death, and from T2D complications to death. These findings highlight the benefit of tea and coffee intake in reducing the risk of occurrence and progression of T2D.</p>","PeriodicalId":7472,"journal":{"name":"American journal of epidemiology","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":5.0,"publicationDate":"2024-10-16","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"142455844","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"医学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Associations between pre-diagnostic plasma metabolites and biliary tract cancer risk in the prospective UK Biobank cohort.","authors":"Valerie Gunchick, Guochong Jia, Wanqing Wen, Jirong Long, Xiao-Ou Shu, Wei Zheng","doi":"10.1093/aje/kwae402","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1093/aje/kwae402","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>Biliary tract cancer (BTC) is potentially influenced by metabolic dysregulation yet previous metabolomic evaluations are limited. To address this gap, we prospectively investigated associations of blood metabolites and BTC risk in the UK biobank cohort study. We used Cox proportional hazards models to estimate hazard ratios (HR) and 95% confidence intervals (95% CI) between 249 plasma metabolites per standard deviation and BTC risk in 232,781 participants. We implemented exploratory factor analyses and evaluated associations between factors and BTC risk. Associations at p-value<0.001 were considered statistically significant after multiple comparison adjustments. In a median follow-up of 11.8 years, we identified 268 first primary incident BTC cases. Of 49 biomarkers significantly associated with BTC risk, 12% were fatty acids, and 49%, 31%, and 8% were cholesterol, triglyceride, and phospholipid to total lipids ratios, respectively. Multiple cholesterol ratios were inversely associated with BTC with HRs (95% CIs) of 0.74 (0.65-0.84), p<6.0x10-6. Conversely, a triglyceride ratio was positively associated with BTC with an HR (95% CI) of 1.40 (1.22-1.61), p=2.5x10-6. Congruently, a factor high in cholesterol measures and low in triglyceride measures was inversely associated with BTC. Multiple metabolite biomarkers were associated with BTC risk, suggesting metabolism has a substantial role in BTC etiology.</p>","PeriodicalId":7472,"journal":{"name":"American journal of epidemiology","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":5.0,"publicationDate":"2024-10-16","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"142455821","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"医学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Surain B Roberts, Michael Colacci, Jiamin Shi, Hilary K Brown, Mahliqa Asrhaf, Therese Stukel, Fahad Razak, Amol A Verma
{"title":"Effect of disability, homelessness, and neighborhood marginalization on risk-adjustment for hospital performance measurement.","authors":"Surain B Roberts, Michael Colacci, Jiamin Shi, Hilary K Brown, Mahliqa Asrhaf, Therese Stukel, Fahad Razak, Amol A Verma","doi":"10.1093/aje/kwae401","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1093/aje/kwae401","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>Background It is not known how disability, homelessness, or neighborhood marginalization influence risk-adjusted hospital performance measurement in a universal health care system. Methods We evaluated the effect of including these equity-related factors in risk-adjustment models for in-hospital mortality, and 7- and 30-day readmission in 28 hospitals in Ontario, Canada. We compared risk-adjustment with commonly-used clinical factors to models that also included homelessness, disability, and neighborhood indices of marginalization. We evaluated models in historical data using internal-external cross-validation. We calculated risk-standardized outcome rates for each hospital in a recent reporting period using mixed-effects logistic regression. Results The cohort included 544,805 admissions. Adjustment for disability, homelessness, and neighborhood marginalization had little impact on discrimination or calibration of risk-adjustment models. However, it influenced comparative hospital performance on risk-standardized 30-day readmission rates, resulting in 5 hospitals being reclassified between below-average, average, and above-average groups. No hospitals were reclassified for mortality and 7-day readmission. Conclusion In a system with universally insured hospital services, adjustment for disability, homelessness, and neighborhood marginalization influenced estimates of hospital performance for 30-day readmission but not 7-day readmission or in-hospital mortality. These findings can inform researchers and policymakers as they thoughtfully consider when to adjust for these factors in hospital performance measurement.</p>","PeriodicalId":7472,"journal":{"name":"American journal of epidemiology","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":5.0,"publicationDate":"2024-10-16","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"142455845","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"医学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}