The Irish Longitudinal Study on Ageing aims to fill the information gap on people over 50, writes PADDY CLANCY
I’VE JUST given away to a total stranger a load of confidential information about my health and property and so far all I have had in return is a number somewhere between 7,980 and 7,990. It’s on a list of 8,000 people whose lives will be monitored during the next 10 years by Tilda.
Tilda will be dropping in every two years to see how I’m progressing. My health, welfare, family life, property, money – even the way I walk – will be of constant interest to Tilda. Already I think of her as a lady, but she’s no such thing.
Tilda is The Irish Longitudinal Study on Ageing – a €29 million 10-year project to evaluate Ireland’s ageing population. It’s the most comprehensive study on ageing ever undertaken in Ireland and the information gathered will be used to improve the health of Irish people, social services and our economic policies.
Researchers on the project, launched in 2006, have described themselves as “really excited” this week. They have just completed their list of exactly 8,000 people over 50 years of age for the study. The home of everybody in the study was specifically chosen via a combination of postal addresses and a geographical directory from the ordnance survey.
I know I’m somewhere between 7,980 and 7,990 – because when I contacted Tilda at her – its – Trinity College HQ in Dublin after I was visited, I learned of the excitement that they had just over a dozen names to reach the targeted 8,000.
Of course, they are going to have an extra few names – presumably to cover any event that will prevent some people undergoing full medical tests to follow the home interviews. But the list closes on February 14th and then work on a series of scientific publications will begin under Tilda principal investigator, Prof Rose Anne Kenny, who is head of the Department of Medical Gerontology at Trinity.
There is an acute shortage of social, economic and health information on older people in Ireland. Prof Kenny says the Tilda data will be crucial in filling the gap and will provide policy-makers in health, social care, pension planning and biotechnology with a unique knowledge base.
Research director Brendan Whelan explains that after the 2006 launch by the then minister for health Mary Harney, there was a lot of early preparatory work done, including a study of international statistics and the preparation of appropriate interview and research machinery for the project. Then there were two pilot studies of 150 people in Dublin and 200 nationwide before the home interviews for the main project got under way last October.
It’s a thoroughly extensive project. My interview lasted 90 minutes, during which I answered questions about what property I own, what pensions I have, what work I still do and what other income I earn, whether relatives and I help each other financially, what exercise I do, what interests me and a host of other details. My memory was tested and I will also have to undergo a full medical at either of the two project health-check centres – Dublin or Cork.
Although the home interviews only started in October, more than 4,500 subjects have already undergone their full medicals with specific aims. Blood systems are tested, eyesight, bone density and even the way people walk – officially titled in research details as “The Gait” – are examined.
The overall study is so intensive that, with age creating falling problems for people unsteady on their feet, there is an aim to identify persons at risk at an early age and take preventative measures for the future.
Already details are emerging in the research that Ireland’s elderly are more active than in the past, better educated and largely tend to own their own homes. With increasing life expectancy, there will be many older people in the population in the coming years – one in five over 65 by 2036.
