Less Hand Osteoarthritis in Longer-Lived Populations
Age-related diseases are among the more visible signs of accumulated biological damage that occurs over time - aging is damage. So we should expect to see less of all such conditions in longer lived populations, and here researchers demonstrate that point for osteoarthritis: "Previous studies have reported that centenarians escape the major age-related diseases. No studies on prevalence and severity of osteoarthritis (OA) in longevity population have previously been reported. Because OA is associated with morbidity and mortality, we hypothesized that radiographic hand OA would generally be less prevalent and would develop at a later age in longevity populations vs non-longevity populations. ... Longevity index was calculated as a ratio of the number of individuals aged [greater than] 90 years vs the number of people aged [greater than] 60, expressed per mil. A population with longevity index [greater than] 40 was considered as a longevity population. ... A significant difference in age standardized prevalence of hand OA was found between each pair of studied samples ... We observed that the pattern of radiographic hand OA in longevity populations differs from the pattern in non-longevity populations. On average, first joints with OA appear at an older age, and progression of hand OA [is] slower."