Karen Birmingham

Abstract

The UK pioneered birth cohort studies and launched 3 national studies in 1946, 1958 and 1970. Professor Jean Golding, who had worked on the latter two studies, went on to design and launch the Avon Longitudinal Study of Parents and Children (ALSPAC) in the early 1990s. ALSPAC was a local, not national study and recruited nearly 15,000 pregnant women residing in the UK county of Avon. The Study has intensively followed up these mothers, their partners, their children and so far approximately 700 grandchildren making it a unique 3-generational study.

Data are collected from: postal questionnaires, health and education records, environmental monitoring, hands-on assessments and biological samples including blood, urine, placentas, hair, nails, teeth and saliva. Lymphoblastic cell lines have been produced and the DNA bank has approximately 25,000 cases currently with available DNA. Many qualitative and quantitative sub-studies have also been carried out.

ALSPAC was innovative in a number of ways: recruitment was during pregnancy allowing for invaluable prenatal data to be collected; the Study had its own Ethics Committee at a time when governance structures in research was minimal or non-existent; genetics was included in the methodology from the outset; detailed data from fathers or partners were also collected.

The ALSPAC data provides an invaluable resource for scientists worldwide and continues to be extensively used; over 1750 scientific papers have been published to date. Strategic planning for ALSPAC’s next 5 years is underway and funding should be confirmed for this period early next year.