At TwinsUK, we want to understand what keeps people healthy, not just what causes disease. Our population health research looks at how things like lifestyle, where we live, and our everyday environment change our health over time. Because we study twins, we can also figure out what’s down to genetics, and what’s influenced by the world around us.
TwinsUK is one of the most detailed health studies in the world, with information collected from our volunteers over many years. This includes health records, clinic visits, questionnaires, and biological samples. It gives us the ability to identify patterns in ageing, wellbeing, and common health conditions.
To make our research even more impactful, we work with some of the UK’s largest health and population organisations:
- UK Longitudinal Linkage Collaboration (UK-LLC) brings together data from over 20 studies like ours, and securely links with NHS, social, and environmental records. This helps researchers ask bigger, broader questions, using real world data.
- Population Research UK (PRUK) helps improve access to these big studies by making it easier to find and use data. It brings the research community together to work more efficiently and make discoveries that can shape healthcare and policies.
- CLOSER supports collaboration across social and health studies. They help researchers work together across different areas to get a more complete understanding of people’s lives.
At King’s College London, we also work closely with projects like The COVID Symptom Study Biobank (CSSB) and Healthspan Connect, looking at things like COVID-19 to better understand the long term effects, and help people live longer and happier lives.
By working together, our data can be used alongside other studies to answer even bigger and more important questions, helping to improve health for everyone.