Greeting [archive] | About Us

Changing the Future of Health — With Innovation and Passion
From Redeeming the “Lowest Life Expectancy Prefecture” to Promoting Health Around the World

President of Center of Healthy Aging Innovation(COI),
Hirosaki Univ.Research Leader(RL)
Special Assistant to the President of Hirosaki Univ. (COI),
Chief of Innovation Center for Health Promotion
Shigeyuki NAKAJI, M.D., Ph.D

In 2013, the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology selected Hirosaki University as one of twelve centers for its national COI STREAM project, a radical innovation and entrepreneurship program.^*1 This was truly an honor for Aomori Prefecture, Hirosaki University and all our participating businesses. I was truly overjoyed when I heard the news.
COI STREAM works to envision “an ideal society existing ten years from today”. To realize this ideal, backcasting research (defining a desirable future and working backwards to determine how to achieve that) and new discoveries are applied to our present society in an effort to stimulate great innovation.
Through analyzing over ten years’ worth of integrated big health data (comprised of 2000 data elements) from the City of Hirosaki’s Iwaki Health Promotion Project, our COI has developed a means to detect early signs of dementia and lifestyle diseases, and continues to propose and verify preventative measures, applying its achievements to society at large. It is our goal to redeem Aomori’s reputation as the prefecture with the lowest life expectancy and create a healthy aging society, “an ideal society existing ten years from today.”
“Preventing and slowing dementia and lifestyle diseases” is an important theme for our COI. This is due to a paradigm shift in this country of high life expectancies, where the average man or woman lives to be over 80 years old. People do not want to simply live longer, they want to be healthier in their old age.
We cannot achieve our goal without the cooperation of industry, academia, the government and the private sector. Fortunately for Aomori Prefecture, these different spheres, along with citizens of the prefecture, are forging ahead with the promotion of good health, independently or in cooperation, united by the objective of extending the average life expectancy. This united front reflects the core beliefs of the national COI project. I sincerely hope the findings of our COI will contribute to health promotion in Aomori Prefecture, improve life expectancies, and go on to be shared with Japan and the world.
*1:This message was written in 2013. As of April 2020, there are 18 COI sites.

The Promise of a Trail-Blazing Project in Preventative Medicine

Governor of Aomori Prefecture
Shingo MIMURA

The COI at Hirosaki University brings together industry, academia, and the government to blaze new trails in preventative medicine by analyzing massive amounts of health data obtained from Hirosaki University’s exceptional research on brain disorders and the Iwaki Health Promotion Project. This work carries great social significance and promises to enrich the health of Aomori’s citizens while also contributing to its regional industries. I pray that this will lead to radical innovation and an improved quality of life for not only a rapidly aging Japan but the entire world.

From Hirosaki to the World
Innovation to Overcome the Unprecedented Aging Society

Mayor of Hirosaki City
Hiroshi SAKURADA

The research of Hirosaki Univ. which aims to detect early lifestyle-related diseases and dementia and to develop prevention by the analysis of Health Big-Data of Iwaki project is a very significant trial for realization of healthy and wealthy society. I expect that the result born in Hirosaki could produce the innovation of preventive medicine and new products and services, and as the innovation to overcome the inevitable unprecedented aging society spread out all over the world.

Hirosaki University is always challenging to achieve healthy longevity society!

President of Hirosaki University
Shinsaku FUKUDA

Our project to redeem “the lowest life expectancy prefecture” has started from “Iwaki Health Promotion Project” , which is a large scale health check for citizens in Iwaki district, Hirosaki-city. Adopted as COI site, it has been developed to be the huge project, participated in by all faculties, local governments, citizens, companies and national institutes, it has formed a big health study platform of academic-industrial collaboration.
Hirosaki University, as a project core, is always challenging to achieve redeeming the lowest life expectancy, innovation for developing preventive medicine, and creating new industries and employment.

The five colors that make up this pentagon stand for “University” (Red), “Business” (Yellow), “Government” (Cyan), “Community” (Blue), and “Residents” (Pink). Together, these colors convey a firm commitment to cooperation. The green that sprouts at the top signifies the birth of innovation, advancement, progress, and the future.