Hostname: page-component-8448b6f56d-xtgtn Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-04-24T01:47:41.241Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Season of birth and Alzheimer's disease: a population-based study in Saguenay-Lac-St-Jean/Québec (IMAGE Project)

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  09 July 2009

H. Vézina ,
L. Houde ,
H. Charbonneau ,
M. Beaudry ,
A. Cholette ,
N. Daoud ,
J. Mathieu ,
Y. Robitaille ,
F. Veilleux  and
D. Gauvreau
H. Vézina
Affiliation:
IMAGE Project, Centre hospitalier Côte-des-Neiges and the Departments of Demography and Pathology, University of Montréal, Montréal; Hôpital de Chicoutimi, Québec, Canada
L. Houde
Affiliation:
IMAGE Project, Centre hospitalier Côte-des-Neiges and the Departments of Demography and Pathology, University of Montréal, Montréal; Hôpital de Chicoutimi, Québec, Canada
H. Charbonneau
Affiliation:
IMAGE Project, Centre hospitalier Côte-des-Neiges and the Departments of Demography and Pathology, University of Montréal, Montréal; Hôpital de Chicoutimi, Québec, Canada
M. Beaudry
Affiliation:
IMAGE Project, Centre hospitalier Côte-des-Neiges and the Departments of Demography and Pathology, University of Montréal, Montréal; Hôpital de Chicoutimi, Québec, Canada
A. Cholette
Affiliation:
IMAGE Project, Centre hospitalier Côte-des-Neiges and the Departments of Demography and Pathology, University of Montréal, Montréal; Hôpital de Chicoutimi, Québec, Canada
N. Daoud
Affiliation:
IMAGE Project, Centre hospitalier Côte-des-Neiges and the Departments of Demography and Pathology, University of Montréal, Montréal; Hôpital de Chicoutimi, Québec, Canada
J. Mathieu
Affiliation:
IMAGE Project, Centre hospitalier Côte-des-Neiges and the Departments of Demography and Pathology, University of Montréal, Montréal; Hôpital de Chicoutimi, Québec, Canada
Y. Robitaille
Affiliation:
IMAGE Project, Centre hospitalier Côte-des-Neiges and the Departments of Demography and Pathology, University of Montréal, Montréal; Hôpital de Chicoutimi, Québec, Canada
F. Veilleux
Affiliation:
IMAGE Project, Centre hospitalier Côte-des-Neiges and the Departments of Demography and Pathology, University of Montréal, Montréal; Hôpital de Chicoutimi, Québec, Canada
D. Gauvreau*
Affiliation:
IMAGE Project, Centre hospitalier Côte-des-Neiges and the Departments of Demography and Pathology, University of Montréal, Montréal; Hôpital de Chicoutimi, Québec, Canada
*
1Address for correspondence: Dr Denis Gauvreau, Unité interdisciplinaire du Project IMAGE, Centre de recherche, Centre hospitalier Côte-des-Neiges, 4565 Chemin-de-la-Reine-Marie, Montréal, Québec, Canada. H3W 1W5.
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Synopsis

The birth distribution of 399 cases of Alzheimer's disease (AD) identified in the region of Saguenay-Lac-St-Jean (Québec) was compared with that of: (a) the population currently living in the area; and (b) the population born during the same period in the area. AD cases have been recruited since 1986 by the IMAGE Project. Cases and controls were grouped according to the month of birth and according to the day of birth using density estimation. Analyses showed a significant deficit of births in the month of May. We believe these preliminary results deserve further attention and we suggest two possible explanations that could lead to a deficit of AD births at specific periods during the year.

Type
Original Articles
Information
Psychological Medicine , Volume 26 , Issue 1 , January 1996 , pp. 143 - 149
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1996

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

REFERENCES

Bailar, J. C. III & Gurian, J. (1967). The medical significance of date of birth. Eugenics Quarterly 14, 89–102.Google Scholar
Boyd, J. H., Pulver, A. E., & Stewart, W. (1986). Season of birth: schizophrenia and bipolar disorder. Schizophrenia Bulletin 12, 173–186.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Bradbury, T. N. & Miller, G. A. (1985). Season of birth in schizophrenia: a review of evidence, methodology, and etiology. Psychological Bulletin 98, 569–594.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Dalén, P. (1990). Does age incidence explain all season-of-birth effects in the literature? Schizophrenia Bulletin 16, 11–12.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
De Braekeleer, M., Cholette, A., Mathieu, J., Boily, C., Robitaille, Y. & Gauvreau, D. (1989). Familial factors in Alzheimer's disease (IMAGE Project). European Neurology 29, (suppl. 3), 2–8.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Duara, R., Lopez-Alberola, R. F., Barker, W. W., Loewenstein, D. A., Zatinsky, M., Eisdorfer, C. E. & Weinberg, G. B. (1993). A comparison of familial and sporadic Alzheimer's disease. Neurology 43, 1377–1384.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Dysken, M. W., Kuskowski, M., Skare, S. S., Roessmann, U., Noronha, A. & Frey, W. H. II (1991). Seasonal distribution of births in Alzheimer's disease. International Psychogeriatrics 3, 53–58.Google Scholar
Fossey, E. & Shapiro, C. M. (1992). Seasonality in psychiatry – a review. Canadian Journal of Psychiatry 37, 299–308.Google Scholar
Fuller Torrey, E., Rawlings, R. & Waldman, I. N. (1988). Schizophrenic births and viral diseases in two states. Schizophrenia Research 1, 73–77.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gatz, M., Lowe, B., Berg, S., Mortimer, J. & Pedersen, N. (1994). Dementia: not just a search for the gene. Gerontologist 34, 251–255.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gauvreau, D., Bouchard, R., Gauthier, S., Mathieu, J., Boily, C., Cholette, A., Robitaille, Y., Bouchard, P., Bouchard, N., Doyon, L.-P., Gaudreault, M., Ouellet, A., Dumont, M., Kishka, P., Fournier, C., Nalbantoglu, J., Lacoste-Royal, G., Gautrin, D., Froda, S., de Braekeleer, M., Bouchard, G. & Mortimer, J. (1988). The IMAGE Project: a geographical laboratory for the investigation of multidisciplinary data. In Research and Perspective in Alzheimer's Disease (ed. Sinet, P. M., Lamour, Y. & Christen, Y.), pp. 40–50. Springer-Verlag: Heidelberg.Google Scholar
Haines, J. L. (1991). Invited editorial: the genetics of Alzheimer disease – a teasing problem. American Journal of Human Genetics 48, 1021–1025.Google Scholar
Henderson, A. S., Korten, A. E., Jorm, A. F., McCusker, E., Creasey, H. & Broe, G. A. (1991). Season of birth for Alzheimer's disease in the Southern Hemisphere. Psychological Medicine 21, 371–374.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Hennekens, C. H. & Buring, J. E. (1987). Epidemiology in Medicine. Little, Brown & Company: Boston.Google Scholar
Hogg, R. V. & Craig, A. T. (1978). Introduction to Mathematical Statistics. MacMillan: New York.Google Scholar
James, W. H. (1990). Seasonal variation in human births. Journal of Biosocial Sciences 22, 113–119.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Kendell, R. E. & Adams, W. (1991). Unexplained fluctuations in the risk for schizophrenia by month and year of birth. British Journal of Psychiatry 158, 758–763.Google Scholar
Lam, D. A. & Miron, J. A. (1991). Seasonality of births in human populations. Social Biology 38, 51–78.Google ScholarPubMed
McKhann, G., Drachman, D., Folstein, M., Katzman, R., Price, D. & Stadlan, E. M. (1984). Clinical diagnosis of Alzheimer's disease: report of the NINCDS-ADRDA Work Group under the auspices of Department of Health and Human Services Task Force on Alzheimer's disease. Neurology 34, 939–944.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Nonaka, K. & Miura, T. (1987). Principles in methods of epidemiological studies on birth seasonality. In Seasonality of Birth. Progress in Biometerology 6, 13–24.Google Scholar
Öhlund, L. S., Öhman, A., Öst, L.-G., Lindström, L. H. & Wieselgren, I.-M. (1991). Electrodermal orienting response, maternal age, and season of birth in schizophrenia. Psychiatry Research 36, 223–232.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Philpot, M., Rottenstein, M., Burns, A. & Der, G. (1989). Season of birth in Alzheimer's disease. British Journal of Psychiatry 155, 662–666.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Saunders, A. M., Strittmatter, W. J., Schmechel, D., St. George-Hyslop, P. H., Pericak-Vance, M. A., Joo, S. H., Rosi, B. L., Gusella, J. F., Crapper-MacLachlan, D. R., Alberts, M. J., Hulette, C., Crain, B., Goldbager, D. & Roses, A. D. (1993). Association of apolipoprotein E allele ε4 with late-onset familial and sporadic Alzheimer's disease. Neurology 43, 1467–1472.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Silverman, B. W. (1986). Density Estimation for Statistics and Data Analysis. Chapman & Hall: London.Google Scholar
St Clair, D. (1994). Genetics of Alzheimer's disease. Some molecular understanding of a diverse phenotype. British Journal of Psychiatry 164, 153–156.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Tiberghien, D., Robitaille, Y., Laroche-Cholette, A., Houde, L., Grenon, M. & Gauvreau, D. (1993). Retrospective assessment of relative risks of coronary arteriosclerosis and myocardial infarct in autopsy confirmed dementias of the AD and non-AD types. In Alzheimer's Disease: Advances in Clinical and Basic Research (ed. Corain, B., Iqbal, K., Nicolini, M., Winblad, B., Wisniewski, H. & Zatta, P.), pp. 121–127. John Wiley & Sons Ltd: Chichester.Google Scholar
Videbech, P. & Nielsen, J. (1984). Chromosome abnormalities and season of birth. Human Genetics 65, 221–231.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Vitiello, B., Hill, J. L., Molchan, S. E., Martinez, R. A., Martinson, H. J. & Sunderland, T. (1991). Lack of seasonal variation in the births of patients with dementia of the Alzheimer type. Psychiatry Research 39, 21–24.Google Scholar