Table 1.

Characteristics of participants in the top and bottom quartiles of plasma carotenoids and tocopherols (1989 – 1990)

Characteristics at blood draw (1989 – 1990)^*	Total Population	By Quartile of Total Plasma Carotenoids		By Quartile of Total Plasma Tocopherols

		1^st	4^th	1^st	4^th

Number of participants	858	213	216	212	217
Mean age (years)	65	64	65	64	65
Mean level of retinol^†	621	592	649	546	698
Mean level of carotenoids^†	1122	617	1754	926	1285
Mean level of tocopherol^†	15779	14128	17591	10704	22581
Masters/Doctorate degree (%)	8	5	11	8	7
Hypertension (%)	34	42	32	26	43
Hypercholesterolemia (%)	33	26	39	14	54
Current postmenopausal hormone use (%)	31	32	33	27	37
Vitamin E use (%)	24	21	34	11	45
Multivitamin use (%)	42	40	50	23	64
Aspirin 2+/week (%)	23	22	24	17	28
Antidepressant use (%)	5	10	3	7	5
Current smoking (%)	14	23	6	20	11
Mean alcohol use (mean g/day)	7	7	6	7	7
(mean METs/week)	19	17	20	16	19
Obesity (BMI ≥ 30kg/m²; %)	12	23	4	13	11

Cognitive Performance at first assessment (1995 – 2001)

TICS (n=858) ^‡	33.9	33.9	33.8	33.8	34.0
Verbal score (n=693) ^‡	−0.02	−0.03	−0.10	−0.01	0.05
Global score (n=693) ^‡	−0.01	−0.07	−0.07	0.02	0.01

Based on n=858

^†

Unit: µg/L, mean weighted by batch

^‡

TICS = Telephone Interview of Cognitive Status; Verbal memory score is an average of the z-scores of four tests among those with complete data on all tests (10 word list Immediate recall, East Boston Immediate recall, East Boston Delayed recall, 10 words list Delayed recall); Global score is an average of the z-scores of six tests among those with complete data on all tests (TICS, East Boston Immediate recall, East Boston Delayed recall, 10 words list Delayed recall, verbal / category function, digit backwards)