Research output: Contribution to Journal/Magazine › Journal article › peer-review
Research output: Contribution to Journal/Magazine › Journal article › peer-review
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TY - JOUR
T1 - Associations of mortality with own height using son's height as an instrumental variable
AU - Carslake, David
AU - Fraser, Abigail
AU - Davey Smith, George
AU - May, Margaret
AU - Palmer, Tom
AU - Sterne, Jonathan
AU - Silventoinen, Karri
AU - Tynelius, Per
AU - Lawlor, Debbie A.
AU - Rasmussen, Finn
N1 - Copyright © 2012 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
PY - 2013/7
Y1 - 2013/7
N2 - Height is associated with mortality from many diseases, but it remains unclear whether the association is causal or due to confounding by social factors, genetic pleiotropy,(1) or existing ill-health. The authors investigated whether the association of height with mortality is causal by using a son's height as an instrumental variable (IV) for parents' height among the parents of a cohort of 1,036,963 Swedish men born between 1951 and 1980 who had their height measured at military conscription, aged around 18, between 1969 and 2001. In a two-sample IV analysis adjusting for son's age at examination and secular trends in height, as well as parental age, and socioeconomic position, the hazard ratio (HR) for all-cause paternal mortality per standard deviation (SD, 6.49cm) of height was 0.96 (95% confidence interval (CI): 0.95, 0.96). The results of IV analyses of mortality from all causes, cardiovascular disease (CVD), respiratory disease, cancer, external causes and suicide were comparable to those obtained using son's height as a simple proxy for own height and to conventional analyses of own height in the present data and elsewhere, suggesting that such conventional analyses are not substantially confounded by existing ill-health.
AB - Height is associated with mortality from many diseases, but it remains unclear whether the association is causal or due to confounding by social factors, genetic pleiotropy,(1) or existing ill-health. The authors investigated whether the association of height with mortality is causal by using a son's height as an instrumental variable (IV) for parents' height among the parents of a cohort of 1,036,963 Swedish men born between 1951 and 1980 who had their height measured at military conscription, aged around 18, between 1969 and 2001. In a two-sample IV analysis adjusting for son's age at examination and secular trends in height, as well as parental age, and socioeconomic position, the hazard ratio (HR) for all-cause paternal mortality per standard deviation (SD, 6.49cm) of height was 0.96 (95% confidence interval (CI): 0.95, 0.96). The results of IV analyses of mortality from all causes, cardiovascular disease (CVD), respiratory disease, cancer, external causes and suicide were comparable to those obtained using son's height as a simple proxy for own height and to conventional analyses of own height in the present data and elsewhere, suggesting that such conventional analyses are not substantially confounded by existing ill-health.
KW - Adolescent
KW - Adult
KW - Body Height
KW - Cause of Death
KW - Confidence Intervals
KW - Confounding Factors (Epidemiology)
KW - Female
KW - Humans
KW - Longitudinal Studies
KW - Male
KW - Nuclear Family
KW - Proportional Hazards Models
KW - Sweden
KW - Young Adult
U2 - 10.1016/j.ehb.2012.04.003
DO - 10.1016/j.ehb.2012.04.003
M3 - Journal article
C2 - 22560304
VL - 11
SP - 351
EP - 359
JO - Economics and Human Biology
JF - Economics and Human Biology
IS - 3
ER -