The National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) has been asked by the Department of Health to develop public health guidance on preventive approaches to be adopted in mid-life to delay the onset of disability, dementia and frailty in later life.  View the final scope for this guidance.

To inform the development of the guidance, NICE is commissioning a number of reviews of the evidence and an economic analysis. The reviews focus on factors associated with dementia, disability and frailty, the effectiveness of interventions in midlife to promote healthy behaviours and the barriers and facilitators to their implementation, specifically:

• A review of the lifestyle factors in midlife and their association with successful ageing and the primary prevention or delay of dementia, non-communicable chronic conditions, frailty and physical disability (Review 1).
• A review of the effectiveness and cost-effectiveness of midlife interventions for increasing the uptake and maintenance of healthy lifestyle behaviours (Review 2).
• A review of the issues that prevent or limit the uptake and maintenance of healthy behaviours by people in midlife (Review 3).

We are interested in a broad range of different types of evidence. This includes, quantitative or qualitative research, including epidemiological/large scale cohort studies, published or unpublished.

We would like to receive details of evidence that relates to Review 1 specifically addressing the questions set out below:

Question 1 Which lifestyle factors in midlife are associated with successful ageing and the primary prevention or delay of dementia, non-communicable chronic conditions, frailty and disability?

Question 2 How strong are the associations and how does this vary for different subpopulations?

We would like to receive details of evidence that relates to the effectiveness and cost-effective of midlife interventions for increasing the uptake and maintenance of healthy lifestyle (Review 2), specifically addressing the questions set out below:

Question 1 What are the most effective and cost-effective midlife interventions for increasing the uptake and maintenance of healthy lifestyle behaviours?

Question 2 To what extent do the different health behaviours prevent or delay dementia?

Question 3 To what extent do the different health behaviours prevent or delay frailty and disability related to modifiable lifestyle risk factors?

Question 4 To what extent do the different health behaviours prevent or delay non-communicable chronic diseases?

We would like to receive details of evidence that addresses the barriers and facilitators to implementing interventions in midlife (Review 3), specifically addressing the questions set out below:

Question 1 What are the key issues for people in midlife that prevent or limit their uptake and maintenance of healthy behaviours and to what extent do they have an effect?

Question 2 How does this differ for subpopulations, for example by ethnicity, socioeconomic status or gender?

Please note we do not need to receive evidence on the following as they will not be covered by the guidance:

• Use of drugs to prevent or treat dementia and non-communicable chronic conditions
• Use of dietary supplements
• Dementia diagnosis and care
• Management of non-communicable chronic diseases.

We would like to receive details of evidence that addresses optimal service models for configuring and delivering services to prevent dementia, disability and frailty in midlife (Review 4), specifically addressing the questions set out below:

Question 1  What are the optimal service models for configuring and delivering services to prevent dementia, disability and frailty – in terms of  intermediate (‘process’) and final service outcomes, clinical outcomes, and costs – taking into account the differing requirements posed by:

• different types of disability
• different types of dementia
• the range of high risk groups
• the range of risky behaviours.

In terms of published material, we are interested in identifying studies that have been published since 2000 that relate to the questions outlined above. The studies may be published in journals, texts or monographs.  

In terms of unpublished material, we are interested in identifying unpublished manuscripts relating to research conducted since 2000, or any ongoing research that is being conducted, and which relates to the review questions outlined above. 

Please note that the following material is not eligible for consideration:

• Promotional material
• Undocumented assertions of effectiveness.
• Opinion pieces
• Forms with electronic attachments of published material, or hard copies of published material.   For copyright reasons, we cannot accept these copies.   However, if you give us the full citation, we will obtain our own copy.

Instructions for Published material

Please send either full reference details (which are to include author/s, title, date, journal or publication details including volume and issue number and page numbers), - NOT a PDF/WORD attachment or hard copy - using this form by 5pm on 28 June 2013 to delayingdisability@nice.org.uk

Instructions for Unpublished material

If you are aware of trials/ongoing research relevant to our questions which are in progress please could you help us to identify that information by providing relevant information such as a link to a trial registered with the Cochrane Central Register of Controlled Trials (Clinical Trials), or with the US National Institutes of Health trials registry. 

If you wish to submit academic in confidence material (i.e. written but not yet published) or commercial in confidence (i.e. internal documentation), please could you highlight which sections are confidential by using the highlighter function in Word.

Please use this form to send in details of any relevant evidence by 5pm on 28 June 2013 to delayingdisability@nice.org.uk

We look forward to receiving information on this and thank you in advance for your help.