by Professor Fiona Blyth AM, CEPAR Chief Investigator and Professor of of Public Health and Pain Medicine, The University of Sydney
The work of CEPAR has continued through the unpredictable and uncertain times of the COVID-19 pandemic, with steady work across all research streams continuing despite the disruptions, uncertainties and adaptations required over the last 18 months. This newsletter contains much evidence of the breadth of the work of CEPAR, ranging from the poor alignment between migration and work/care regimes to an analysis of the changing demographic profile of ageing prisoner populations here in Australia, and the interplay between the built and social environment and dementia trends.
This edition of the newsletter includes a cohort profile update from the Concord Health and Ageing in Men Project (CHAMP), a longitudinal study established in 2005 that has developed a major focus on exploring multidimensional aspects of ageing in 1705 men aged 70 and over. At the time of starting the study, there was a relative lack of studies examining ageing specifically in men. Use of routinely collected data in conjunction with an ongoing cohort study was not firmly established at this time, but as the profile update paper outlines, data linkage to sources such as hospital admissions and cancer registries has added to the ability to better explore the health trajectories of older men. An example of this is the finding highlighted in a previous newsletter that low socioeconomic position was associated with mortality and psychosocial factors accounted for up to one-third of these inequalities. During the pandemic, additional data were collected to help evaluate the impact of COVID-19 on psychosocial health of older men.
CEPAR Research Fellow Dr Saman Khalatbari-Soltani is currently leading a project to develop a cohort repository toolkit which will include information on the CHAMP Study and all other ageing cohort studies in Australia and internationally which will also be publicly available on the CEPAR website. This toolkit will be a valuable tool for researchers, public health professionals and health policymakers.