The Tohoku Journal of Experimental Medicine
Online ISSN : 1349-3329
Print ISSN : 0040-8727
ISSN-L : 0040-8727
Review
Design and Progress of Child Health Assessments at Community Support Centers in the Birth and Three-Generation Cohort Study of the Tohoku Medical Megabank Project
Tomoko KobayashiMika KobayashiNaoko MinegishiMasahiro KikuyaTaku ObaraMami IshikuroChizuru YamanakaTomomi OnumaKeiko MurakamiFumihiko UenoAoi NodaAkira UrunoJunichi SugawaraKichiya SuzukiEiichi N. KodamaYohei HamanakaNaho TsuchiyaMana KogureNaoki NakayaMakiko TairaMika Sakurai-YagetaToru TamaharaJunko KawashimaMaki GotoAkihito OtsukiRitsuko ShimizuSoichi OgishimaHiroaki HashizumeFuji NagamiTomohiro NakamuraAtsushi HozawaTadao KobayashiNobuo FuseShinichi KuriyamaShigeo KureMasayuki Yamamoto
Author information
JOURNAL OPEN ACCESS FULL-TEXT HTML

2023 Volume 259 Issue 2 Pages 93-105

Details
Abstract

The Tohoku Medical Megabank Project (TMM) has been conducting a birth and three-generation cohort study (the BirThree Cohort Study). We recruited 73,529 pregnant women and their family members for this cohort study, which included 23,143 newborns and 9,459 of their siblings. We designed and are in the process of conducting three-step health assessments for each newborn at approximately ages of 5, 10 and 16. These health assessments are administered at seven community support centers. Trained genome medical research coordinators conduct physical examinations of and collect biological specimens from each participant. The Sendai Children’s Health Square has been established as the headquarters for these child health assessments and is utilized to accumulate knowledge that can facilitate the proper practice of child health assessments. We designed all the relevant health assessments facilities to allow parents and their children to participate in the health assessments concomitantly. Our centers serve as places where child participants and their parents can feel at ease as a result of the implementation of safety measures and child hospitality measures. The TMM BirThree Cohort Study is in the process of conducting strategically detailed health assessments and genome analysis, which can facilitate studies concerning the gene-environment interactions relevant to noncommunicable diseases. Through these operations, our study allows for a significant depth of data to be collected in terms of the number of biospecimens under study and the comprehensiveness of both basic and clinical data alongside relevant family information.

Content from these authors
© 2023 Tohoku University Medical Press

This article is licensed under a Creative Commons [Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International] license.
This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License (CC-BY-NC-ND 4.0). Anyone may download, reuse, copy, reprint, or distribute the article without modifications or adaptations for non-profit purposes if they cite the original authors and source properly.
https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/
Next article
feedback
Top