Full Description
The first edition in 1997 of A life course approach to chronic disease epidemiology became a classic text for epidemiological and public health researchers interested in the childhood origins of adult chronic disease. Since then the new field of life course epidemiology has expanded rapidly, attracting the interest not only of academics across the health and social sciences but also policy makers, funding bodies, and the general public. Its purpose is to study how biological and social factors during gestation, childhood, adolescence and earlier adult life independently, cumulatively and interactively influence later life health and disease.
Contributors to this fully revised second edition capture the excitement of the developing field and assess the latest evidence regarding sources of risk to health across the life course and across generations. The original chapters on life course influences on cardiovascular disease, diabetes, blood pressure, respiratory disease and cancer have been updated and extended. New chapters on life course influences on obesity, biological ageing and neuropsychiatric disorders have been added. Life course explanations for disease trends and for socioeconomic differentials in disease risk are given more attention in this new edition, reflecting recent developments in the field. The section on policy implications has been expanded, assessing the role of interventions to improve childhood social circumstances, as well as interventions to improve early growth. Emerging new research themes and the theoretical and methodological challenges facing life course epidemiology are highlighted.
Contents
PART I - BACKGROUND ; 1. Introduction ; 2. The life course and adult chronic disease: an historical perspective with particular reference to coronary heart disease ; PART II - LIFE COURSE INFLUENCES ON ADULT CHRONIC DISEASE ; 3. Pre-adult influences on cardiovascular disease ; 4. Life course approaches to socioeconomic differentials in health ; 5. Ischaemic heart disease and cerebrovascular disease mortality trends with special reference to England and Wales: are there cohort effects? ; 6. Geography and migration with special reference to cardiovascular disease ; 7. A life course approach to diabetes ; 8. A life course approach to obesity ; 9. A life course approach to blood pressure ; 10. A life course approach to respiratory and allergic diseases ; 11. A life course approach to cancer epidemiology ; 12. Time trends in cancer incidence and mortality ; 13. A life course approach to biological ageing ; 14. A life course approach to neuropsychiatric outcomes ; PART III - BIOLOGICAL AND SOCIAL PROCESSES ; 15. Fetal growth and development: the role of nutrition and other factors ; 16. Socioeconomic pathways between childhood and adult health ; PART IV - IMPLICATIONS FOR POLICY AND FUTURE RESEARCH ; 17. Should we intervene to improve fetal and infant growth? ; 18. Should we intervene to improve childhood circumstances? ; 19. Conclusions
