An old age individual will be having some or the other complication ie age dependent. So how can we consider him/her as healthy control for any disease cohort. Well the self acclaimed healthy individuals.
Dear Atulji,
Age- and sex- matched controls are essential because biologic characteristics can be modified by age and sex, in ways both known and unknown. For example, young children have higher absolute lymphocyte counts on peripheral blood than adults. So, you cannot take a healthy adult as a control subject for a young child with a disease.
Regarding your second query, the individual must be certified by history taking and clinical examination to be healthy. For that matter, if you are aiming to recruit adults in the age group of 50 or so as control subjects, every possible precaution must be taken to ensure they do not have undiagnosed comorbid conditions like diabetes or hypertension, by simple screening methods such as a blood pressure measurement or HbA1c.
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