ArticleAge (Dordrecht, Netherlands)2013
Thymic function failure and C-reactive protein levels are independent predictors of all-cause mortality in healthy elderly humans.
Article in Age (Dordrecht, Netherlands), 2013. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 59 papers, 1 of them a synthesis that pooled it.
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The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
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Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
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Who cites it
59 citing papers in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it, 107 citations in OpenAlex.
- Immunosenescence: A systems-level overview of immune cell biology and strategies for improving vaccine responses.Experimental gerontology · 2019Pooled it
- Use of Nutraceuticals in Elderly to Fight Inflammation and Immuno-Senescence: A Randomized Case-Control Study.Nutrients · 2022Trial
- Iron deficiency and biomarkers of inflammation: a 3-year prospective analysis of the DO-HEALTH trial.Aging clinical and experimental research · 2022Trial
- Long-Term Cancer and Mortality After Thymectomy.European journal of neurology · 2026Article
- Automated Quantitative Evaluation of Age-Related Thymic Involution on Plain Chest CT.Annals of biomedical engineering · 2025Article
- Heterogeneity of thymic output in the elderly and its association with sex and smoking.JCI insight · 2025Article
- Aging and immunity: the age-old tango.Genes & development · 2025Review
- Development and validation of AI-based automatic segmentation and measurement of thymus on chest CT scans.BMC medical imaging · 2025Article
- Adaptive immune responses against common viruses are sustained and functional in end-of-life patients.iScience · 2025Article
- The impact of aging on neutrophil functions and the contribution to periodontitis.International journal of oral science · 2025Review
- The Role of Senescence, its Therapeutic Relevance and Clinical Implications in the Tumor Microenvironment.Theranostics · 2025Review
- Detection of HHV-5 HHV-6a HHV-6b and HHV-7 in the urine: potential use as a non-invasive diagnostic tool for immune profiling.Immunity & ageing : I & A · 2024Article
- Fasting and calorie restriction modulate age-associated immunosenescence and inflammaging.Aging medicine (Milton (N.S.W)) · 2024Review
- Premature thymic functional senescence is a hallmark of childhood acute lymphoblastic leukemia survivorship.Blood cancer journal · 2024Article
- Primary and secondary defects of the thymus.Immunological reviews · 2024Review
- Complete fatty degeneration of thymus associates with male sex, obesity and loss of circulating naïve CD8Immunity & ageing : I & A · 2023Article
- Thymic function and survival at advance ages in nursing home residents from Southern Italy.Immunity & ageing : I & A · 2023Article
- Lymphocyte-to-C reactive protein ratio as novel inflammatory marker for predicting outcomes in hemodialysis patients: A multicenter observational study.Frontiers in immunology · 2023Observational
- Association between Immunosenescence, Mitochondrial Dysfunction and Frailty Syndrome in Older Adults.Cells · 2022Article
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Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
8 authors at 5 institutions in 1 country.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
Relationship between thymic function and elderly survival has been suspected, despite the fact that formal proof is elusive due to technical limitations of thymic function-related markers. The newly described sj/β-TREC ratio allows now, by overcoming these limitations, an accurate measurement of thymic output in elderly humans. Thus, the aim of this study was to determine the impact of thymic function and inflammatory markers on healthy elderly human survival. Healthy volunteers (n = 151), aged over 65, were asked to participate (CARRERITAS cohort). Subjects were excluded if diagnosed of dementia or, during the last 6 months, had clinical data of infection, hospital admission, antitumor therapy, or any treatment that could influence the immune status. Thymic function (sj/β-TREC ratio), CD4:CD8 T cell ratio, C-reactive protein, interleukin-6, and neutrophilia were determined from basal samples. All basal variables and age were associated with 2-year all-cause mortality. Multivariate analysis showed that only thymic function and C-reactive protein were independently associated with time to death. In conclusion, we show, for the first time, the direct role of thymic function in human survival. C-reactive protein raise is also a marker of mortality in the healthy elderly, in a thymic-independent way.
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Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.