page_title: Caerphilly Heart Disease Study
section_title: Study design
hierarchical_section_title: Caerphilly Heart Disease Study / Study design
caption_attribution_description: English: The Caerphilly Study research team, photographed outside the South Wales MRC Unit in the 1980s.
context_page_description: The Caerphilly Heart Disease Study, also known as the Caerphilly Prospective Study, is an epidemiological prospective cohort, set up in 1979 in a representative population sample drawn from Caerphilly, a typical small town in South Wales, UK.
  The initial aim was to examine relationships between a wide range of social, lifestyle, dietary and other factors with incident vascular disease. Opportunity was also taken, in collaboration with a range of clinical and laboratory colleagues, to collect data on a wide range of factors with possible relevance to diseases other than vascular, and at the same time to collect clinical information on incident disease events.
  The study was initiated by Professor Peter Elwood OBE, Director of the Medical Research Council Epidemiology Unit for South Wales. The work has so far led to over 400 publications in the medical press.
context_section_description: In 1979, all men aged between 45 and 59 years, who were on the electoral registers and/or general practice lists for Caerphilly and the adjoining villages of Abertridwr, Senghenydd, Trethomas, Bedwas and Machen were invited to co-operate in a long-term health study.  2,512 subjects (89% of the total eligible population) agreed to participate and were examined in Phase 1 (baseline) between July 1979 and September 1983.
  Since then, the men have been re-examined seven times (at five-year intervals) with approximately 95% of the surviving men co-operating in each re-examination. Many questions and tests have been repeated, but the opportunity has also been taken to include new questionnaires and tests.  In the early phases of the study, samples of fasting blood were collected for extensive testing and long-term storage, and on occasions urine and other biological samples were also taken, and aliquots stored.  Thus, while the initial aims of the study focused upon vascular disease, the wealth of data collected has enabled the testing of a large number of hypotheses relevant to other diseases too.
  From the start of the study, the term 'Collaborative' was usually added to the title, paying tribute to the many physicians, laboratory technicians and other colleagues, expert in a wide range of clinical and metabolic disciplines, who were actively involved in the work.
  Heart disease prevalence is far greater in men than women – therefore women were not included in the study.  A far larger sample size would have been required if women had been the focus of the study, and unfortunately, the available resources were not sufficient for this.
  The work in Caerphilly was often linked with the Speedwell Study, a similar study operating in nearby Bristol, 60 km away. The survey techniques were similar and a number of questionnaires and biological tests were used in both the studies. This enabled a number of joint reports on vascular disease, and in particular on the relevance of blood lipids, to be based on the five thousand subjects within the two cohorts together.
caption: The Caerphilly Study research team, photographed outside the South Wales MRC Unit in Cardiff during the 1980s.
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