Latest news with #MoanaTheodore
Otago Daily Times
02-07-2025
- Health
- Otago Daily Times
Otago scientists develop tool to estimate dementia risk
By Rowan Quinn of RNZ Dunedin scientists have helped develop an internationally groundbreaking tool that estimates a person's risk of getting dementia and other age-related diseases. It uses a single MRI scan that can be done in mid-life and before someone is showing any signs of the conditions. Otago University scientists worked with Duke and Harvard universities in the United States and have published their findings in the prestigious medical journal Nature Aging this week. Data from Otago's Dunedin Study - which has followed 1037 participants since they were born in 1972 and 1973 - has been critical in the work. That study looked at changes in blood pressure, glucose and cholesterol levels, tooth and gum health and other body functions over 20 years to see how quickly people were ageing. That data was then compared with an MRI taken when the study participants were 45 and a tool - an algorithm known as Dunedin PACNI - was developed that can look at anyone's MRI and estimate how they might age. Dunedin Study director Professor Moana Theodore said study members who had higher or faster PACNI scores were more likely to have poorer health. "And also poorer physical functioning, things like walking and balance, and also poorer cognitive function, things like poorer memory even though they were, at that stage in their mid 40s," she said. The new tool was then tested out on 50,000 brain scans from data on people aged 50-89 in other parts of the world. "In those studies of older people we were able to identify things like the development of chronic disease, so, an increased likelihood of heart attacks or strokes, an increased risk of being diagnosed with dementia over time and even an increased mortality," she said. The study found those who were ageing faster had more shrinkage in the hippocampus region of the brain and performed worse on cognitive tests. Professor Theodore said the tool could help change outcomes for people. "If we can predict ageing, especially in mid-life.... then what we are able to do is prevent, possibly intervene earlier on to stop or slow down age related diseases like dementia for which there is currently no clear treatment," she said She and her team were incredibly proud of the work - and she thanked the Dunedin Study members and their families for their 50 year contribution. "It's wonderful to have a New Zealand study that is at the forefront of international research on ageing and how to support people to age positively and well and how to reduce age related diseases that cause people to have poorer quality of life later in life," she said. DunedinPACNI will be freely available for scientists around the world to use to further their own work on ageing.
RNZ News
02-07-2025
- Health
- RNZ News
Single MRI scan could be used to estimate dementia risk
The new tool was tested out on 50,000 brain scans. Photo: Stock New Zealand scientists have helped develop an internationally groundbreaking tool that estimates a person's risk of getting dementia and other age-related diseases. It uses a single MRI scan that can be done in mid-life and before someone is showing any signs of the conditions. Otago University scientists worked with Duke and Harvard universities in the United States and have published their findings in the prestigious medical journal Nature Aging this week. Data from Otago's Dunedin Study - which has followed 1037 participants since they were born in 1972 and 1973 - has been critical in the work. That study looked at changes in blood pressure, glucose and cholesterol levels, tooth and gum health and other body functions over 20 years to see how quickly people were ageing. That data was then compared with an MRI taken when the study participants were 45 and a tool - an algorithm known as Dunedin PACNI - was developed that can look at anyone's MRI and estimate how they might age. Dunedin Study director Professor Moana Theodore said study members who had higher or faster PACNI scores were more likely to have poorer health. "And also poorer physical functioning, things like walking and balance, and also poorer cognitive function, things like poorer memory even though they were, at that stage in their mid 40s," she said. The new tool was then tested out on 50,000 brain scans from data on people aged 50-89 in other parts of the world. "In those studies of older people we were able to identify things like the development of chronic disease, so, an increased likelihood of heart attacks or strokes, an increased risk of being diagnosed with dementia over time and even an increased mortality," she said. The study found those who were ageing faster had more shrinkage in the hippocampus region of the brain and performed worse on cognitive tests. Professor Theodore said the tool could help change outcomes for people. "If we can predict ageing, especially in mid-life.... then what we are able to do is prevent, possibly intervene earlier on to stop or slow down age related diseases like dementia for which there is currently no clear treatment," she said She and her team were incredibly proud of the work - and she thanked the Dunedin Study members and their families for their 50 year contribution. "It's wonderful to have a New Zealand study that is at the forefront of international research on ageing and how to support people to age positively and well and how to reduce age related diseases that cause people to have poorer quality of life later in life," she said. DunedinPACNI will be freely available for scientists around the world to use to further their own work on ageing. Sign up for Ngā Pitopito Kōrero , a daily newsletter curated by our editors and delivered straight to your inbox every weekday.
RNZ News
14-06-2025
- Health
- RNZ News
Landmark 'Dunedin Study' founder Dr Phil Silva dies, aged 84
Dr Phil Silva. Photo: Dunedin Multidisciplinary Health and Development Study The founder of a landmark study following more than a thousand babies born in the early 1970s has died. Dr Phil Silva, who started the Multidisciplinary Health and Development Study - commonly known as the 'Dunedin Study' - died on Thursday, aged 84. He began the study, which followed the lives of 1037 babies born at Queen Mary Maternity Hospital, Dunedin, in 1972. Current Dunedin Study director Professor Moana Theodore. Photo: Supplied Current Dunedin Study director Professor Moana Theodore said he was "an interesting academic", who previously worked as a former primary school teacher and psychologist. Teaching rural children in the 1960s underpinned his life's work, she added. "He always had a passion for teaching, and helping support children and their families." A masters degree and doctorate in research focused on children began under Otago University lecturer Dr Patricia Buckfield in the late 1960s, Theodore said. Buckfield had an interest in neonatology and gathered data on every baby born at Dunedin's Queen Mary obstetric hospital between 1967-73. This lead to the creation of the Dunedin Multidisciplinary Health and Development Unit, under Silva's direction. Theodore said Silva was an energetic mentor, who "took people along with him", and this bolstered the study's success, despite the odds of little funding. "In the very early days, that meant he was able to bring on board hundreds of volunteers, who would help the study. "He was incredibly driven, he had this huge energy and he faced almost impossible odds to set up the Dunedin Study in those early days, but he didn't let a lack of resource deter him. "Through this ability to create relationships and to bring people on board with this greater purpose of improving other people's lives, he was able to get hundreds of volunteers to collect data and that has been something that's made the Dunedin Study really special." The study's 90 percent participation rate - more than 50 years later - was "unparalleled in the world", she said. "A lot of that is to do with it's really a community study - it's proudly the Dunedin Study, it's not just the Dunedin Study - and that began with Phil." Silva mentored both the previous director - the late Professor Richie Poulton, who ran the study after Phil retired, beginning in 1999 or 2000 - as well as Theodore, she said. "He hired me originally as an interviewer at the age-26 assessment phase, when the study members were 26, back in 1998, and he always kept actively involved in supporting and providing advice to me as well. "He was so passionate about improving the lives of others and, starting in early life, he once argued publicly that New Zealanders, as a whole, could be seen to care more about their cars than they did about their children. They would check cars every six months to a year. "His research and his vision for improving lives resulted in things like more routine check-ups for children, particularly in pre-school, and this growing understanding of health in those early years, such as the high rates of glue ear, and the need to show compassion to our children and young people, particularly if they were seen to be going off the rails." The study made the cover of Time magazine in 1993 - a year before he was awarded an OBE for services to health and education. "The headline read, 'All you need is love'. That summed up how Phil really felt about children and young people." Silva left behind "an incredible legacy" said Theodore. "We continue to work to uphold [that] and we're seeing study members now at age 52, through this lifetime of service. "Dr Phil has left this legacy and a taonga [prize] for New Zealand, which leaves behind the best childhood foundation guarder in the world - and the most studied group of people anywhere in the world." Sign up for Ngā Pitopito Kōrero , a daily newsletter curated by our editors and delivered straight to your inbox every weekday.
