This supplement application identifies and organizes health questions and measures of Alzheimer?s and other cognitive impairments using data maintained or supported by NACDA Specifically, the National Social Life, Health and Aging Project (NSHAP) and the National Health and Aging Trends Study (NHATS). The mission of the National Archive of Computerized Data on Aging (NACDA) is to create a dynamic and flexible data infrastructure to stimulate health research and advance knowledge as it related to the gerontological lifecourse. Through the development and delivery of research resources and data services, NACDA alerts researchers to opportunities for secondary data analysis, provides tools to locate and access relevant materials, and enhances the availability of gerontological data. To fulfill this mission, NACDA accomplish four specific goals: 1) Enhance and expand the longitudinal collections maintained by NACDA; 2) Advise and assist in the documentation and archiving of data and metadata for researchers who are producing longitudinal, repeat measure and linked data; 3) Distribute enhanced data and documentation to researchers in a form that will facilitate their use,; and 4) Facilitate secondary analysis by providing user support, access to data, training and consultation. By the carefully tracking all aspects of user support requests and data use by the community we will more effectively identify and target emerging research trends and training needs so we can continue to evolve our programs and support services. The proposed supplement address these goals by identifying variables measuring AD and other cognitive impairments within NSHAP and NHATS as well as sociodemographic, and comorbidity data commonly associated with increased risk of AD and other cognitive impairments. As both NSHAP and NHATS represent multiple waves of longitudinal follow-up the project will create longitudinal analysis files that allow for the measurement of AD and other cognitive impairments risk across time. The proposed supplement will also generated enhanced metadata using DDI Lifecycle software to make discoverability of AD and other cognitive impairments variables more straightforward and increase the user-friendly elements of these studies. Finally, the proposed supplement will create a customized bibliography of the use of NSHAP and NHATS data in the analysis of AD and other cognitive impairments research, allowing researchers to more easily review the existing body of literature using these data resources. This supplement will increase the availability, usability and discoverability of AD and other cognitive impairments information in these studies, encouraging use of NSHAP and NHATS for Alzheimer?s related research and adding to our understanding of how cognitive issues change across time.
The project promotes a better understanding of health and the promotion of health behaviors by collecting data and research information on the aging lifecourse. Specifically, this application will gather baseline information on Alzheimer?s Disease and other cognitive impairments among aged populations in the US.
