Obtaining participant consent Patients were invited to read a study information sheet and encouraged to ask questions about the research, after which written informed consent was sought from patients for: a) completion of a baseline health questionnaire; b) provision of a blood sample for long-term storage and analysis of DNA and biomarkers; c) extraction of patient data from their medical records; and d) linkage of patient data with national electronic health record data sources (e.g. coded hospitalisations and procedures, emergency admissions and cause-specific mortality).