http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2690118/pdf/milq0080-0433.pdf

Describes the Life Course Health Development (LCHD) framework, which was created to explain how health trajectories develop over an individual’s lifetime and how this knowledge can guide new approaches to policy and research. Throughout this article, they illustrate how risk factors, protective factors, and early-life experiences affect people’s long-term health and disease outcomes.