Please use this identifier to cite or link to this item: https://hdl.handle.net/10419/200121 
Year of Publication: 
2018
Citation: 
[Journal:] Demographic Research [ISSN:] 1435-9871 [Volume:] 38 [Publisher:] Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research [Place:] Rostock [Year:] 2018 [Pages:] 1933-2002
Publisher: 
Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research, Rostock
Abstract: 
Background: It has become increasingly common in multiple purpose general population surveys to integrate different kinds of biomarker in the data collection process.Objective: In this article we test the predictive power of five different functional forms of CVD-related biomarkers for all-cause and CVD mortality in the Health and Retirement Study (HRS).Methods: We use five different functional forms of biomarker: A risk factor index, risk factors separately, continuous biomarkers, risk groups comprising every possible combination of risk factors, and a cluster analytic approach to identify risk profiles in the sample. We use data from the Health and Retirement Study (HRS) with information on four collected biomarkers (glycated hemoglobin (hbA1c), high-density lipoprotein (HDL), total cholesterol, and C-reactive protein (CRP)) with an eight-year mortality follow-up period.Results: The results show that the additive index has comparatively high predictive power, relative to its simplicity. Risk profiles were identified in the data, with substantial differences in mortality risk between the profiles. The more complex functional forms improve prediction only moderately compared to the simple index, although we can identify groups with an elevated mortality risk that are not identified in more parsimonious approaches.Conclusions: Depending on the specific research question, both a very simple modeling of biomarker information and more detailed examinations of specific complex risk profiles can be appropriate.Contribution: The study provides initial guidelines for the measurement of commonly used biomarkers, which can be a reference for other studies that use biomarkers as health indicators or for mortality prediction.
Subjects: 
Biomarkers
Functional form
Health and retirement study (HRS)
Mortality
Risk profiles
Persistent Identifier of the first edition: 
Creative Commons License: 
cc-by Logo
Document Type: 
Article
Document Version: 
Published Version

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