"[1] The 1946 birth cohort study (which became known later as National Survey of Health & Development) was set up by J. W. B. Douglas less than a year after the end of the second world war.
[4] Originally this survey was intended as a one-off project and was designed to answer questions such as;why had the national fertility rate in Britain been consistently dropping?
[5] The results from this survey influenced the decisions made when setting up the British National Health Service in 1948.
The mission of the Unit is to realise the scientific potential of the NSHD as a world class, interdisciplinary life course study by: The NSHD was formerly based at the London School of Economics (under the direction of Dr. James Douglas and at the University of Bristol), and then the Department of Epidemiology and Public Health at University College London (under the direction of Professor Michael Wadsworth).
In 2016, the survey was operating under the MRC Unit for Lifelong Health and Ageing (which was established in 2008) and based in Bloomsbury, London, England, directed by Professor Diana Kuh.