Collaborations

MELODEM

MELODEM (Methods in longitudinal dementia research) is an international initiative aiming at harmonizing analytic approaches across longitudinal studies in dementia risk or cognitive decline.

Several methodological challenges arise in studies of the determinants of dementia risk and cognitive decline. Some challenges, such as unmeasured confounding or missing data, are common in many research areas; others, such as outcome measurement error and lack of a “gold standard” outcome assessment, are more pervasive or more severe in dementia research.

MELODEM was launched in 2012, under the coordination of Carole Dufouil (INSERM, University of Bordeaux, France) and Maria Glymour (USCF, USA) with the support of the Foundation Plan Alzheimer. MELODEM has many other supporters, including INSERM, University of Bordeaux, and the Lister Hill Center at the University of Alabama at Birmingham. MELODEM is also supported by a grant from the NIH/NIA(R13AG064971). 

Check out more information about MELODEM here!

KHANLDE/STAR/LA90 COLLABORATOR SITE

The Kaiser Healthy Aging and Diverse Life Experience (KHANDLE:) cohort is a multi-ethnic study (approximately even proportion of White, Black, Asian, and Latino) aiming to evaluate (1) racial/ethnic differences in cognitive decline and dementia incidence, (2) how lifecourse sociocultural and health factors influence ethnoracial cognitive differences in late-life, and (3) how ethnicity/race and cumulative vascular risk influence late-life brain health.

The Study of Healthy Aging in African Americans (STAR), initiated in 2018, is an ongoing cohort of Black or African American individuals examining lifecourse risk and protective factors of cognitive aging. Goals of the study are to understand the trajectory of normal cognitive aging from midlife to late life, the burden of cognitive impairment among this population, and identify risk and protective factors related to healthy brain aging among Black and African American individuals, an understudied and rapidly expanding segment of the elderly population at higher risk for dementia.

The Life After 90 Study (LA90) is a collaborative study between DOR, UC Davis, and UC Irvine following a diverse cohort of approximately 1,000 KPNC members age 90 and over to examine life course risk factors of cognitive decline and dementia risk. This study is evaluating differences in dementia incidence and rate of cognitive decline by race/ethnicity; evaluating how life course experiences are related to dementia incidence and cognitive decline; and examining life course factors associated with biomarkers from braining imaging and pathology. In 2022, we intend to begin to enroll an additional 500 KPNC members age 90 and over.

The Glymour group is grateful to have access to these datasets and collaborate on the publications involving them.

Evidence for Action

The Evidence for Action (E4A) National Program Office is housed in the Center for Health and Community based at the University of California, San Francisco. The program supports the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation’s vision to advance health and racial equity across the United States. Dr. Glymour leads the E4A Methods Laboratory and reviews letters of intent and full proposals.

Learn more about E4A here!