Prospective urban and rural epidemiology Poland – study design

Introduction

Health improvements marked with impressive increase of life expectancy can be seen throughout human populations. The first half of the twentieth century brought a dramatic decline in childhood and infectious diseases, but this was accompanied with a growing prevalence of chronic conditions. On average the population gained 20 years of life between 1948 and 1998, when life expectancy at birth reached 66 years. Socio-economic development and new consumption patterns are the main driving forces of this new health and life experience. Economic growth takes place in cycles with the most turbulent processes in low- and middle-income countries. Urbanisation is one of most visible results of this change. The prognosis of this situation is that by 2020 over 85% of the world’s population will live in developing countries. It brings an urgent need to understand the connections between the forces and processes behind socioeconomic development and the burden of the diseases especially chronic diseases, like obesity, diabetes, and cardiovascular diseases, accompanying this process. The PURE study is a research project attempting to challenge issues. It is a global research project established to elaborate a strategy to link and analyse environmental (cultural-socio-economic) factors with individual biological (metabolic, genetic, and lifestyle) conditions. Participants were recruited from 21 low-, middle-, and high-income countries, such as: Argentina, Brazil, Chile, China, India, Tanzania, Thailand, Turkey, Zimbabwe, and the United Arab Emirates, representing different parts of the world, reaching in total over 150,000 people. The research centre is located in the Population Health Research Institute in Hamilton, Canada. The principal investigator of the project is Professor Salim Yusuf [1, 2].
The average life expectancy in Poland is growing every year. In 2015 it was 73.6 years for males and 81.6 for females. This difference between genders is present in urban and rural areas (urban: M – 74, F – 81.5, rural: M – 73, F – 81.7). Unfortunately, we are still behind in comparison to western European countries, which is a reason to proceed with studies concerning medical issues of Poles and ways to solve them despite the increase in life expectancy during the last 25 years. Answers to the mentioned issues might be provided by the PURE study.

Research hypothesis

Risk factors arising from environmental, genetic, and psychosocial...


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