MRC NSHD 2006 - 2012 Muscle and Bone Specialist Data

The MRC National Survey of
Health and Development (NSHD) has informed UK health care, education
and social policy for more than 50 years and is the oldest and
longest running of the British birth cohort studies. Today, with
study members in their seventies, the NSHD offers a unique
opportunity to explore the long-term biological and social processes
of ageing and how ageing is affected by factors acting across the
whole of life. <br>From an initial maternity survey of
5362 births recorded in England, Scotland and Wales during one week
of March 1946, a socially stratified sample of singleton babies born
to married parents was selected for follow-up. These participants
have been studied over twenty times throughout their life.
<br>During their childhood, the main aim of the NSHD
was to investigate how the environment at home and at school affected
physical and mental development and educational attainment. During
adulthood, the main aim was to investigate how childhood health and
development and lifetime social circumstances affected their adult
health and function and their change with age. Now, as participants
have reached retirement, the research team is developing the NSHD
into a life course study of ageing. <br>Study members
were asked to attend a clinic at age 60-64 for a range of assessments
(or alternatively have a home visit). 792 men and 866 women who attended
clinics were given DXA scans to assess muscle and bone health. These scans
included Total Body DXA, Hip and Spine DXA,
Single and Dual Energy Vertebral Fracture Assessment (VFA),
and pQCT of the forearm at 4% and 50% levels.