Clinical Trial Details
— Status: Completed
Administrative data
| NCT number |
NCT00081679 |
| Other study ID # |
1247 |
| Secondary ID |
R01HL072819 |
| Status |
Completed |
| Phase |
N/A
|
| First received |
April 19, 2004 |
| Last updated |
April 15, 2014 |
| Start date |
June 2004 |
| Est. completion date |
May 2007 |
Study information
| Verified date |
January 2008 |
| Source |
The Miriam Hospital |
| Contact |
n/a |
| Is FDA regulated |
No |
| Health authority |
United States: Federal Government |
| Study type |
Observational
|
Clinical Trial Summary
To further characterize the nature of the association between socioeconomic status (SES),
health behaviors and early cardiovascular disease in the Vietnam Era Twin (VET) Registry, a
sample of over 4,000 twin pairs.
Description:
BACKGROUND:
Cardiovascular disease (CVD) affects approximately 60,800,000 Americans each year, claiming
the lives of nearly one million of these people (American Heart Association, 2001). CVD is
likely to be complex in etiology, reflecting the combined effect of both genes and
environment, as well as gene x gene and gene x environment interaction. Examination of
environmental factors thought to affect CVD risk in the context of a genetically informative
design can help elucidate the relative contribution of genetic and environmental factors and
potentially aid in identifying environmental factors that may interact with genetic
vulnerability in predicting CVD. Cardiovascular morbidity and mortality are over-represented
among individuals in lower socioeconomic strata, as are behaviors that increase the
likelihood of cardiovascular events, including smoking, heavy alcohol consumption and
physical inactivity (Adler et al., 1994; Anderson & Armstead, 1995). Thus, it is commonly
assumed that socioeconomic status (SES) serves as an important environmental influence on
health and health behaviors. Twin studies partition genetic and environmental variance and
detect gene x environment interaction and provide a unique opportunity to study the
association between SES and health.
DESIGN NARRATIVE:
The study will characterize the nature of the association between socioeconomic status
(SES), health behaviors and cardiovascular disease (CVD) in the existing Vietnam Era Twin
(VET) registry, a sample of over 4000 male twin pairs with a mean age of 51 in 1999.
Specifically, the study will: 1) determine how strongly environmental factors contribute to
individual differences in SES, health behaviors and CVD, relative to genetic factors; 2)
examine whether measures of SES are associated with health behaviors and CVD mortality when
controlling for concomitant genetic influences; and 3) investigate whether SES interacts
with genetic vulnerabilities to predict health behaviors and CVD (gene x environment
interaction). Using VETdatasets, the primary method of analysis will be twin structural
equation modeling.
