All eligible study members were contacted.
Provided information | 3,322 | ||||||
Cumulative total of deaths | 323 | ||||||
Cumulative permanent refusals | 520 | ||||||
Temporarily living abroad | 73 | ||||||
Cumulative emigrated | 571 | ||||||
Failure to contact | 553 | ||||||
Data collection was carried out at home visits to cohort members by research nurses recruited by the study team. Questionnaires were used to ask about family and home circumstances, health, employment and social participation, experience of disturbing life events, smoking habits and diet. The nurses made a number of body measurements, measured pulse rate, blood pressure, respiratory function, and used the short Present State Examination, a clinically validated questionnaire that evaluated mental health.
Nurses explained how to use the diet diary, and asked cohort members to post them back at the end of five consecutive days of completion.
Cohort members self-completed questionnaires about leisure time exercise and returned them to the nurse.
The study team and specialist colleagues trained the nurses over three consecutive days. The nurses’ instruction manual is available to view.