Among Japanese prefectures, Okinawa has the highest percentage of centenarians per population over 65 years old. The occurrences of hypertension, heart disease and diabetes of 50-59 year old female in Okinawa are 35%, 24% and 46%, respectively, of the average in Japan. In the last report, Taketomi (island) and Ohgimi (village in northern Okinawa) were found to be high in the percentage of aged people over 70 years old. However, owing to the limited medical care in these remote places, objective medical data of these people have not been available. In this report, daily activities, circulatory and neurological functions and other health conditions of these people are described.
Nearly the total number of people over 80 years old (13 males, 84.01±3.35 years, 23 females, 83.52±4.38 years) of Taketomi and a part of the people in Ohgimi (4 males, 96.75±7.0 years and 13 females, 95.46±5.83 years) were examined. In contrast to the average Japanese of 60 years old, 10% of them received medical treatment and none of these Okinawans had visited a doctor before the age of 60, except one person. Nobody was bedfast, only 2 were housebound and 3 were limited in their mobility. Nearly 100% of them could perform their daily activities such as feeding, excretion, dressing and expression of their will without help. Two had cataract in their single eye and 6 had difficulty in hearing. These results are quite different from the survey conducted on 1.83 million Japanese aged people; only 39.9% of them were healthy and 43.5% of them needed medical treatment.
Although average Okinawans are the smallest in their physique among the Japanese, these people surveyed were as large as the average Japanese of 71 years old and over. Their blood pressure was as high as those of the average Japanese of 60 years old (Taketomi, m. 146.4±27.0/76.4±10.8; f. 155.9±23.2/77.8±8.5; Ohgimi, m. 129.3±5.4/76.8±15.1; f. 162.2±27.6/86.5±9.6mmHg). Their ECG showed very few myocardial damage cases (manifest Q wave 3, negative T wave 3) and were similar to ECG of Japanese centenarians. Paralysis and pathological reflexes were not detected in neurological examinations. Thus cases of apoplexia, if any, might be very few and slight in degree. Urinalysis findings showed only 1 case of glucosuria and 5 cases of slight proteinuria.
No heavy smoker or alcohlics were found in these people. Their preference were fish, meats and egg. They rather dislike salty foods. These results are in accord with the National Nutrition Survey of 1972 in which Okinawans were shown to take more meat (144.8%), green yellow vegetables (133.9%) and animal fats (119.6%) and less sugar and cakes (48.9%), condiments (52.5%) and carbohydrates (74.9%) than the average Japanese (100% for each items).
Most of their parents, brothers and sisters showed longevity, and only 6 out of 36 Taketomi families lost both parents before the parents reached 69 years old. The cause of death in their youth were malaria, accident, war, tuberculosis, tetanus, puerperal sepsis, febrile diseases etc. And some of these people in Ohgimi had snake bite (Habu, 2 cases) and fish intoxication (Fugu, 1 case).
Their hard farming work is now changed to easy work (Ohgimi, cane sugar and pineapple production: Taketomi, livestock farming and weave). Traditional food habit and customs are now vanishing. The impact of westernization to these district will be followed in future.
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