Widow looking for answers after Quebec man dies in Texas Ironman competition
The widow of a Quebec man who died competing in an Ironman competition is looking for answers.
A new Canadian-led study has found that feeling depressed, along with living in a disadvantaged neighbourhood, may lead to premature aging.
The peer-reviewed study, published on Monday in The Journals of Gerontology, Series A: Biological Sciences and Medical Sciences, points to how depression and living in an urban environment – with greater material and social inequities – can influence how a person ages.
Led by researchers at McMaster University in Hamilton, Ont., the study's authors say this may occur "even after accounting for individual-level health and behavioural risk factors, such as chronic conditions and poor health behaviours."
"This adds to the growing body of evidence that living in urban areas with higher levels of neighbourhood deprivation and having depression symptoms are both associated with premature biological aging," team lead Parminder Raina, a professor in the Department of Health Research Methods, Evidence, and Impact at McMaster University, said in a news release.
The researchers used epigenetic data from 1,445 people enrolled in the Canadian Longitudinal Study on Aging, a long-term study that follows about 50,000 participants between the ages of 45 and 85 for at least 20 years.
The study is described as examining how changing biological, medical, psychological, social, lifestyle and economic factors impact a person's health as they age.
Epigenetics is the study of how behavior and environment can influence how a person's genes work.
The researchers measured depression symptoms using a standardized 10-item scale.
They say a one-point increase in the score accelerated a person's risk of death by one month, with the theory being that emotional distress caused by depression could lead to "more biological wear and tear and dysregulation of physiological systems."
In order to measure "neighbourhood material and social deprivation," the researchers used a pair of indices, based on the 2011 census, from the Canadian Urban Environmental Health Research Consortium.
They described material deprivation as a person's inability to obtain resources such as adequate housing, nutritious food, a vehicle, high-speed internet or recreational facilities, while social deprivation refers to family and community connections.
The researchers say greater neighbourhood deprivation increased a person's "risk of death by almost one year," but did not worsen the effect that depression had on aging.
In other words, both were independently associated with premature aging.
"Our results showed that the effect of neighbourhood deprivation on epigenetic age acceleration was similar regardless of depression symptoms, suggesting that depression influences epigenetic age acceleration through mechanisms unrelated to neighbourhood deprivation," Divya Joshi, first author of the study and a research associate at McMaster University, said.
The research team also included members from the Netherlands, Norway and Switzerland.
The widow of a Quebec man who died competing in an Ironman competition is looking for answers.
Former NDP leader Tom Mulcair says that what's happening now in a trash-littered federal park in Quebec is a perfect metaphor for how the Trudeau government runs things.
The world is seeing a near breakdown of international law amid flagrant rule-breaking in Gaza and Ukraine, multiplying armed conflicts, the rise of authoritarianism and huge rights violations in Sudan, Ethiopia and Myanmar, Amnesty International warned Wednesday as it published its annual report.
A photographer who worked for Megan Thee Stallion said in a lawsuit filed Tuesday that he was forced to watch her have sex, was unfairly fired soon after and was abused as her employee.
Facing pushback from physicians and businesspeople over the coming increase to the capital gains inclusion rate, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and his deputy Chrystia Freeland are standing by their plan to target Canada's highest earners.
The Senate passed legislation Tuesday that would force TikTok's China-based parent company to sell the social media platform under the threat of a ban, a contentious move by U.S. lawmakers that's expected to face legal challenges.
People living near a wildfire burning about 15 kilometres southwest of Peace River are being told to evacuate their homes.
The U.S. Senate has passed US$95 billion in war aid to Ukraine, Israel and Taiwan, sending the legislation to President Joe Biden after months of delays and contentious debate over how involved the United States should be in foreign wars.
A Winnipeg man said a single date gone wrong led to years of criminal harassment, false arrests, stress and depression.
The giant stone statues guarding the Lions Gate Bridge have been dressed in custom Vancouver Canucks jerseys as the NHL playoffs get underway.
A local Oilers fan is hoping to see his team cut through the postseason, so he can cut his hair.
A family from Laval, Que. is looking for answers... and their father's body. He died on vacation in Cuba and authorities sent someone else's body back to Canada.
A former educational assistant is calling attention to the rising violence in Alberta's classrooms.
The federal government says its plan to increase taxes on capital gains is aimed at wealthy Canadians to achieve “tax fairness.”
At 6'8" and 350 pounds, there is nothing typical about UBC offensive lineman Giovanni Manu, who was born in Tonga and went to high school in Pitt Meadows.
Kevin the cat has been reunited with his family after enduring a harrowing three-day ordeal while lost at Toronto Pearson International Airport earlier this week.
Molly Knight, a Grade 4 student in Nova Scotia, noticed her school library did not have many books on female athletes, so she started her own book drive in hopes of changing that.
Almost 7,000 bars of pure gold were stolen from Pearson International Airport exactly one year ago during an elaborate heist, but so far only a tiny fraction of that stolen loot has been found.