Table 1. Baseline characteristics by gender.
| Men (n=836) | Women (n=1158) | P-value* | |||
| Mean age in years±standard deviation | 73.0 | ±6.7 | 73.7 | ±6.5 | 0.022 |
| Range: 65-97 | |||||
| Number of deaths (%) | 203 | (24.0) | 195 | (16.6) | <0.001 |
| Mortality rate (per 100 person-year) | 3.7 | 2.4 | <0.001 | ||
| N | (%) | N | (%) | ||
| Health status | |||||
| Diagnosed illness (Yes) | 521 | (62.3) | 773 | (66.8) | 0.041 |
| Self-rated health (Fair/poor) | 152 | (18.2) | 238 | (20.6) | 0.208 |
| Socio-economic factors | |||||
| Annual income (< ¥ 1 million) | 223 | (26.7) | 467 | (40.3) | < 0.001 |
| Home ownership (Yes) | 822 | (98.3) | 1116 | (96.4) | < 0.001 |
| Social relationships | |||||
| Living arrangement (Alone) | 13 | (1.6) | 77 | (6.6) | < 0.001 |
| (Couple only) | 181 | (21.7) | 149 | (12.9) | |
| (Multi-generation) | 642 | (76.7) | 932 | (80.5) | |
| Casual friend (Yes) | 683 | (81.7) | 1002 | (86.5) | 0.004 |
| Support provider (Yes) | 612 | (73.2) | 920 | (79.4) | 0.001 |
| Group membership (Yes) | 654 | (78.2) | 898 | (77.5) | 0.743 |
| Job (Yes) | 655 | (78.3) | 758 | (65.5) | < 0.001 |
*: P-values were calculated using χ2 test for categorical data, and t-test for quantitative data.