Amita Sharma and Willem J. M. I. Verbeke*
Self-management abilities are described as a general ability to manage one’s own aging process. In this paper we study whether biomarkers extracted from blood are associated with self-management abilities. We explore the confounding effects of age and gender on a sample of Dutch citizens (N=9431) provided by the Lifelines Cohort Study Biobank, focusing on two age groups: 18–64 years and above 65 years. We built logistic models linking the total self-management abilities score and biomarkers data. All models had R-squared values of less than 3% and were significant (p-value<0.05). We found that the high-density lipoprotein level was significant in all models, and basophilic, eosinophilic, erythrocytes, leukocytes, and neutrophilic granulocytes, all related to the human immune system, were also significant in one or two models. This indicates that the immune system plays a role in affecting the total self-management abilities score. We also uncovered confounding effects in age and gender variables indicating heightened health risks for elderly females.
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