Health and Aging Brain Study-Health Disparities (HABS-HD) methods and partner characteristics

The Health and Aging Brain Study-Health Disparities (HABS-HD) is an ongoing prospective study aimed at understanding brain health and aging. The current work provides a description of the cohort baseline characteristics and outlines the study methodology.

We analyzed available data from n = 1066 non-Hispanic Black (NHB), n = 1425 Hispanic, and n = 1349 non-Hispanic White (NHW) partners who were actively enrolled in HABS-HD. Descriptive statistics are presented for each racial/ethnic group across demographic, medical, and diagnostic characteristics. Differences in select amyloid (A), tau (T), and neurodegenerative (N) biomarkers spanning proteomic and neuroimaging were examined along with groupwise differences for cognitive test performance and select social determinants of health (SDoH) factors.

The characteristics of the cohort revealed significant groupwise differences in age, education, sex, and cognitive diagnosis. Higher rates of cognitive impairment (mild cognitive impairment [MCI] and dementia) were found in NHB and Hispanic compared to NHW partners, despite the latter group being older. There were also higher rates of hypertension and diabetes among NHB and Hispanic compared to NHW partners. Differences were also found across many plasma (A/T[N]) biomarkers and select neuroimaging measures, including meta-region of interest and white matter hyperintensities. Positron emission tomography amyloid positivity rates (but not tau positivity) were found to differ, with higher rates observed among NHW (15% amyloid positivity) compared to NHB (3%) partners. Groups also differed by select SDoH factors, including household income, insurance, having a health-care provider, and Area Deprivation Index. All cognitive measures also revealed groupwise differences.

The baseline cohort characteristics for HABS-HD reveal significant group differences spanning demographic, medical, cognitive, and biological factors (including A/T[N] biomarkers), which are all critical to understand as they relate to aging and age-related diseases.

The Health and Aging Brain Study-Health Disparities (HABS-HD) cohort baseline characteristics and study methodology were provided.Cohort characteristic differences were found across demographic factors, including age, education, sex, and cognitive diagnosis across the representative groups.Biomarkers for amyloid/tau/neurodegeneration spanning blood and neuroimaging were shown to differ as well across cohort groups.Positivity rates for amyloid positron emission tomography were lower for non-Hispanic Black partners in the cohort compared to non-Hispanic White partners.