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Table 3 Hours of sleep, perceived general health, family history of cancer, cancer screening participation, and bowel movement of members of the NLCS-Meat Investigation Cohort by meat consumption status

From: The Netherlands Cohort Study – Meat Investigation Cohort; a population-based cohort over-represented with vegetarians, pescetarians and low meat consumers

  Men Women
  All confirmed vegetarians, pescetarians and low meat consumers from the total cohort Random sample of meat consumers from the total cohort   Self-reported vegetarians All confirmed vegetarians, pescetarians and low meat consumers from the total cohort Random sample of meat consumers from the total cohort   Self-reported vegetarians
  Vegetarian Pescetarian 1 day/wk 2–5 day/wk 6–7 day/wk    Vegetarian Pescetarian 1 day/wk 2–5 day/wk 6–7 day/wk   
  n = 217 n = 152 n = 482 n = 1326 n = 2973 P b n = 416 n = 485 n = 242 n = 914 n = 1639 n = 2676 P b n = 734
Hours of sleep per day (h) 7.8 ± 1.1c 7.7 ± 0.9 7.8 ± 1.1 7.8 ± 1.1 7.8 ± 1.1 0.34 7.8 ± 1.1 7.6 ± 1.1 7.6 ± 1.1 7.5 ± 1.3 7.6 ± 1.2 7.6 ± 1.1 0.28 7.6 ± 1.1
Perceived general health (%)               
 Excellent 25% 22% 19% 18% 18% 0.12 24% 20% 20% 14% 13% 13% <0.001 20%
 Reasonable/good 69% 72% 71% 75% 74%   72% 70% 67% 72% 77% 79%   70%
 Poor/bad 6% 7% 10% 7% 8%   4% 10% 13% 14% 9% 7%   11%
Family history of cancer at baseline (first degree) (% yes) 40% 47% 45% 43% 46% 0.57 42% 47% 43% 50% 46% 48% 0.20 48%
Cancer screening (women only)               
 Cervical Smear (% yes)         73% 73% 74% 76% 73% 0.50 74%
 Breast cancer screening (% yes)         23% 25% 29% 32% 28% 0.031 26%
Bowel movement (men only)               
 >2 times per day 7% 5% 5% 3% 3% <0.001 6%        
 1–2 times per day 43% 46% 35% 34% 35%   44%        
 Once a day 48% 45% 54% 57% 56%   47%        
 Every two days or less 2% 3% 6% 7% 6%   3%        
Constipation frequency (men only)               
 Never 55% 62% 46% 53% 56% 0.008 53%        
 Seldom 36% 27% 40% 34% 33%   36%        
 Sometimes or more often 9% 11% 13% 13% 11%   12%        
  1. aExcluding prevalent cancer cases at baseline.
  2. bP values are derived from one way anova for continuous variables and from a chi2 test for categorical variables comparing the five meat consumption groups (vegetarian, pescetarian, 1 day/wk-, 2–5 day/wk-, and 6–7 day/wk meat consumers).
  3. cMean ± SD, all such values.
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