Tomonori Okamura

..The objective of this study is to investigate the effect of self-reported sleep duration and sleep quality on the risk of developing diabetes in a prospective cohort in Japan...

..033). The serum CRP level might be an important marker for arterial stiffness in Japanese middle-aged males. However, no relation was observed between alpha-tocopherol and baPWV...

..There was an increase of CAC in heavy drinkers (>or=46 g/day), and participants who were drinking>or=69 g/day showed a significant increase in CAC compared with never drinkers after adjusting for other cardiovascular risk factors...

..In a population with a markedly lower coronary mortality such as in Japan, the benefit of cholesterol screening may be different from Western populations. We attempted to assess the importance of cholesterol screening in Japan...

..Whether the relationship between cardiovascular risk factor clustering and medical expenditures differs with body mass index (BMI) requires investigation, especially in a population with a low prevalence of obesity such as that in Japan...

..The pressor effect, per se, of popular Japanese alcoholic beverages on blood pressure may not be different among the types of alcoholic beverages after adjusting for other lifestyle factors...

..05; 95% CI, 0.89-1.24). Although the cut-off point seemed to be higher than that for Western populations, hypercholesterolemia was shown to be positively associated with all-cause mortality in Japan...

..However, there have been few prospective data from non-Western populations...

..As in the many Western populations, serum HDL-C levels were inversely associated with all-cause mortality in the Japanese general population...

..There is no population-based prospective study concerning the relation between serum albumin and mortality in a non-Western population, and few previous studies included the subgroup analysis stratified by serum cholesterol level...

..07; 95% CI: 0.80-1.42). The results suggest that there may be no causal relation between hypertension and the ALDH2 genotype per se, after excluding for some confounding factors, especially for alcohol drinking...

..To examine the association between levels of serum albumin and total cholesterol (TC) and risk of subsequent mortality and future decline in activities of daily living (ADLs) in elderly people...

..This study examines whether having a favorable risk factor profile yields lower all-cause mortality and whether the proportion of those with a low-risk profile is larger in the Japanese population...

..00-2.24) even after adjustment for systolic blood pressure. In conclusion, a family history of stroke could not predict total stroke mortality. However, a family history of hypertension might predict an increased risk for total stroke...

..Fish consumption may be protective against early atherosclerosis in middle-aged men, probably through its beneficial effects on inflammation...

..In addition to improved management of high blood pressure, the increase in average height might also contribute to this reduction. The present study investigates whether height is an independent risk for stroke mortality in Japan...

..Efforts to warn about the adverse consequence of HT and smoking during adolescence and youth could yield the greatest health benefits, since positive behaviors adopted early are more easily continued into middle adulthood and later life...

..For the Japanese population, a body mass index (BMI) of 25.0-29.9 is classified as obesity and is a risk factor for cardiovascular disorders such as hypertension...

..8% for 1 gou/day, 0.7% for 2 gou/day or more, and -0.1% for ex-drinkers in women. In conclusion, we found that a large percentage of the hypertensives in a general Japanese male population had alcohol-induced hypertension...

..However, little has been published about the relationship between smoking and CVD mortality among populations with various cholesterol levels...

..Few studies have reported the relationship between smoking in middle age and long-term risk of impaired activities of daily living (ADL)...

..We investigated the impact of moderate metabolic risk factor clustering on cardiovascular disease (CVD) mortality...

..The association between the CETP TaqIB polymorphism and HDL cholesterol levels was more evident in alcohol consumers than in non-drinkers...

..However, a simple questionnaire regarding salt intake was not sufficient to confirm the relationship between salt intake and hypertension and/or salt-sensitive genes...

..Obesity now is playing a more important role in the high prevalence of hypertension in Japan than it was before...

..Exploring the significance and biological mechanisms of GGT might provide useful insights into CVD prevention...

..4% among hypertensives and 4.1% among normotensives. Left high R-wave on electrocardiogram, irrespective of the level of systolic blood pressure, was a predictive marker for cardiovascular death among community-dwelling Japanese...

..There have been few studies on the relationships of the dietary polyunsaturated to saturated fatty acid ratio (P/S) to cardiovascular risk factors and metabolic syndrome. We hypothesized that there would be favorable relationships...

..Little is known about the prognostic value of q wave abnormality for cardiovascular disease (CVD) on a resting electrocardiogram (ECG) of the Japanese general population with an extremely low incidence of myocardial infarction...

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..NIPPON DATA80/90 is cohort study of representative Japanese population, and the cohorts also participated in the National Nutrition Survey in Japan (NNSJ) at the baseline. The corresponding datasets could be combined...

..13; 95% confidence interval (CI): 1.10-1.16; p<0.0001) and sex (HR=2.18; 95%CI: 1.23-3.85; p=0.007). However, the A1166C polymorphism of AGTR1 was not a predictive factor for cardiovascular events (HR=1.11; 95%CI: 0.61-2.02; p=0.731)...

..Age- and sex-specific population attributable fraction (PAF) and premature deaths attributable to smoking were estimated from a pooled analysis of cohort studies in Japan...

..In conclusion, in a general sample, the frequency of MS was 16.0% in men, and 0.9% in women. There was no relationship between ADRB3 polymorphism and MS...

..However, the relationship between protein intake and renal function is still uncertain, especially in relatively healthy general population...

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..Because egg yolk has a high cholesterol concentration, limited egg consumption is often suggested to help prevent ischemic heart disease (IHD)...

..No such study is examined in Japan, the country with the world's highest life expectancy irrespective of high smoking rate among men...

..Chronic kidney disease (CKD) has been identified as a risk factor for cardiovascular disease (CVD)...

..We investigated the relationship between metabolic risk factor clustering and cardiovascular disease (CVD) mortality stratified by high blood glucose or obesity...

..In conclusion, high blood pressure was a useful predictor for excess medical costs; moreover, concomitant hypertension, regardless of the grade, increased the medical costs of Japanese National Health Insurance beneficiaries...

..0-22.9 and 23.0-24.9 kg/m(2). Our findings do not support the recent WHO implications that BMIs <23.0 kg/m(2) is healthy for Asians. Therefore, further studies are needed to identify an optimal BMI range for Asia...

..Because such an association has been noted in other populations, this issue should be re-examined in a recent representative Japanese cohort with a higher total cholesterol level...

..In this study, we investigated the relation of GGT or alcohol drinking with DM incidence considering the body mass index (BMI) in healthy Japanese workers...

..These findings may partly explain the excess mortality of the Japanese males with low serum TC...

..The relationship between psychosocial characteristics and smoking cessation behavior was examined among Japanese male eversmokers with type 2 diabetes mellitus...

..In conclusion, high blood pressure raised the risk of total mortality, and this trend was higher in the younger Japanese population...

..In conclusion, ST-T abnormalities with or without left high R waves on electrocardiogram recorded at rest constitute an independent predictor of CVD mortality in Japanese men and women...

..Thus, it might predict CVD mortality, but few studies have reported on this relationship...

..CONCLUSIONS: Alcohol intake did not have beneficial effects on HDL levels in the defective ALDH2 genotype and may not protect against CAD in subjects with defective ALDH2 genotypes...

..However, the precise incidence and its association with QT intervals remain unknown in the greater cohort of the population in Japan...

..3 +/- 5.8 vs 7.3 +/- 4.2 (microg/mL) despite higher levels of obesity. Smaller areas of visceral adipose tissue in American than in Japanese men may have resulted in the higher levels of adiponectin...

..It is concluded that 7-nitroindazole is a relatively selective nNOS inhibitor; however, at high concentrations, it inhibits eNOS in monkey cerebral arteries...

..However, the relationship between serum ALT and BMI has not been satisfactorily elucidated...

..Abstainers maintain their smoking cessation if they refrain from smoking for three years...

..Since men who have never married might be at higher risk for CVD, effort should be made to educate this population about decreasing lifestyle-related risk factors...

..Similar results were observed in the female subjects. Taken together, these findings indicate that it is possible to compare trends of predicted relative risk for coronary heart disease between two groups...

..As the general features of the smoking scenes, most of them do not necessarily require smoking in the story. Furthermore, there was little consideration about separation of designated smoking areas...

..In Asian countries, prevalence of obesity has increased and smoking rate in men is still high. We investigated the attribution of the combination of smoking and metabolic syndrome (or obesity) to excess CVD deaths in Japan...

..We examined the knowledge regarding heavy drinking and smoking as risk factors of stroke according to drinking/smoking habits among randomly selected Japanese general population...

..Prejunctional inhibition by muscarinic receptor activation is unlikely associated with opening of neuronal K+ channels...

..The fact that the hypoxia-induced impairment of vasodilator nerve function was prevented by cooling may partially explain the efficacy of hypothermia in protecting against ischemic neuronal injury in the brain...

..An educational campaign by mass media has been associated with great increases in the knowledge about early symptoms of stroke. However, few studies were conducted with a controlled community intervention study...

..To examine the effectiveness of a small-scale smoking cessation intervention program conducted annually for ten years in an occupational setting in Japan...

..In human uterine arteries, the vasodilator prostaglandin is released from subendothelial tissues due to AT1 receptor stimulation by the peptide...

..The absolute risk of cardiovascular disease may be unchanged if we assume 23 g increment of ethanol intake in Japan because the risk reduction in coronary heart disease was nearly equal to the risk increment in stroke...

..The neurogenic relaxation seems to be mediated exclusively by nitric oxide synthesized from L-arginine in perivascular nerves that activates guanylate cyclase and produces cyclic GMP in smooth muscle...

..Blockade of muscarinic prejunctional inhibition, superoxide scavenging action and phosphodiesterase inhibition are not involved...

..CONCLUSIONS: These results indicate that both abnormal pteridine metabolism and vascular oxidative stress are linked to coronary endothelial dysfunction in the insulin-resistant subjects...

..Plasma BNP levels were inversely associated with blood haemoglobin levels. Gender-specific analysis showed similar results. However, plasma BNP did not correlate with other cardiovascular risk factors such as serum lipids...

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..These findings suggest that N-type, but not L-type, calcium channels are responsible for increasing cytosolic free calcium, a prerequisite for the synthesis of NO, in the nitrergic dilator nerves innervating the corpus cavernosum...

..To compare the effectiveness of health education on smoking cessation for all smokers regardless of their willingness to quit smoking and cumulative environmental changes including designation of smoking places, legislation, and price rise...

..This is the first direct evidence indicating an important role of nitric oxide liberated by pre- and postganglionic nerve stimulation in the control of cerebral arterial tone in primates...

..The Japanese men had a larger VAT and VSR in each stratum, despite substantially less obesity overall. In multiethnic studies, difference in abdominal fat distribution should be considered in exploring factors related to obesity...

..High blood pressure caused by nitric oxide synthase inhibitors is associated with an elimination of nitroxidergic nerve function together with an impairment of the basal release of nitric oxide from the endothelium...

..The neurogenic relaxation is associated solely with activation of beta1 adrenoceptors by norepinephrine but is not mediated by NO or VIP...

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..These results indicate that relative excess of O2- production through activation of NADH/NADPH oxidase over NO generation in endothelial cells may contribute to impaired endothelial-dependent relaxation in insulin-resistant state...

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..Thus, we examined a representative cohort of the Japanese population (n=9,444, follow-up period 17.3 years) to clarify whether high casual blood glucose (CBG) can predict CVD mortality...

..The effects of diastolic blood pressure on intracerebral haemorrhage and infarction had the same tendency as those of SBP. These results suggested that the causal effect of blood pressure on stroke subtypes might be modified by BMI...

..The role of serum fatty acids as a risk factor for stroke and stroke subtypes is largely unknown...

..The association of obesity measures (ie, body mass index (BMI), waist circumference (WC) and waist-to hip ratio (WHR)) with metabolic risk factors in community-based populations has not been well studied...

..2% and 35.3% in men and 7.1% and 23.4% in women, respectively. In conclusion, high-normal blood pressure is a risk factor for the incidence of stroke and myocardial infarction in a general urban population of Japanese men...

..In initial analyses, we found significant differences between serum adiponectin in Japanese living in Japan and Hawaii...

..These findings suggest that elevated homocysteine levels among Japanese with the homozygous genotype for the MTHFR gene mutation can be modified efficiently by dietary supplement of vitamin B12 as well as folate...

..We sought to examine whether marine-derived n-3 fatty acids are associated with less atherosclerosis in Japanese versus white populations in the U.S...

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..The relationship between body mass index (BMI) and stroke mortality remains unclear. The aim of the present study was to elucidate the relationship between BMI and stroke death in a representative cohort of Japanese men and women...

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..These findings indicate that this program is effective and can be implemented in similar workplaces where the prevalence of smoking is high and smokers' readiness to cease smoking is low...

..To clarify the relationship between mortality due to cardiovascular diseases (CVD) and systolic blood pressure (SBP) and diastolic blood pressure (DBP) in young and elderly Japanese men in the absence of antihypertensive treatments...

..Fatigue is one of the most common symptoms encountered in medical practice. However, little is known about the causal relationship between change in lifestyle and fatigue...

..Although light and moderate alcohol drinkers are likely to have better subjective health, the sub-scales for subjective health have not been well documented...

..To determine whether lipoprotein-associated phospholipase A2 (Lp-PLA2) levels are related to the difference in the prevalence of CAC between the two populations...

..CONCLUSIONS: PAI-1 levels were significantly lower in American than in Japanese men and the determinants of PAI-1 levels differ for American and Japanese men aged 40-49...

..671 +/- 0.006 mm for the whites and 0.618 +/- 0.006 mm for the Japanese, P = .01, mean +/- SE). Differences in the distributions of NMR lipoproteins between the 2 populations did not explain the higher IMT in the whites...

..We investigated the impact of active smoking and exposure to passive smoke on the risk of developing diabetes...