Poland and US collaborative study on cardiovascular epidemiology. II. Correlates of lipids and lipoproteins in men and women aged 35-64 years from selected Polish rural, Polish urban, and US samples.

Three diverse samples of men and women aged 35-64 years living in urban Poland, rural Poland, and the United States, are described and subsequently analyzed by multiple regression methods. Total cholesterol, low density lipoprotein (LDL) cholesterol, high density lipoprotein (HDL) cholesterol, and the natural logarithm (ln) of triglycerides are treated separately as dependent variables, with several demographic, behavioral, and biologic factors as independent variables. In the analyses of total cholesterol, systolic blood pressure was statistically significant in men and women in all three samples, while Quetelet index, cigarette smoking, age, ethanol consumption, and education were significant in at least one of the samples. In the LDL cholesterol analyses, Quetelet index and cigarette smoking were the predominant variables; in the HDL cholesterol analyses, Quetelet index, cigarette smoking, ethanol consumption, and age were key variables; and in the ln triglycerides analyses, Quetelet index, cigarette smoking, education, and systolic blood pressure were significant.