Occupation on the death certificate: to use or not to use, that is the question

Details

• Personal Author:
  Lilienfeld DE
• Description:
  Discussions centering on the inclusion of occupational information on death certificates were held at the NIOSH and National Center for Health Statistics (NCHS) conference held in Washington, D.C. in January of 1987; in this letter to the editor, various questions and concerns arising from that meeting were discussed. Much of the discussion considered the low cost, ready access to such data which is important in considering data entry to a system. Also of concern was the reliability of the occupational information contained on the certificate. What is needed is information which is representative of lifetime work history, not simply the last known occupation. Studies were cited which indicated that death certificate statements concerning occupation do not correspond to lifetime occupations in 30 to 50 percent of the cases. There had been some suspicion, however, that coding of death certificates in large urban areas is less accurate than such coding in rural areas. Until the validity of such data can be determined and found to be acceptable, the use of them in epidemiological studies must remain suspect. [Description provided by NIOSH]
• Subjects:
  Epidemiology Mortality Neoplasms Occupational Health Risk Assessment Safety
• Keywords:
  Cancer Cancer-rates Mortality-rates Mortality-surveys NIOSH-Grant NIOSH-Publication Risk-analysis
• ISSN:
  0271-3586
• Document Type:
  Text
• Funding:
  Grant
• Genre:
  Report
• Place as Subject:
  Michigan ; OSHA Region 10 ; OSHA Region 5 ; Washington
• CIO:
  National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH)
• Topic:
  Workplace Safety & Health
• Location:
  North America
• Pages in Document:
  119-120
• Volume:
  14
• Issue:
  2
• NIOSHTIC Number:
  nn:00186998
• Citation:
  Am J Ind Med 1988 Feb; 14(2):119-120
• Contact Point Address:
  Dr. David E. Lilienfeld, Division of Environmental and Occupational Medicine, Box 1057, Mount Sinai School of Medicine, New York, NY 10029-6574
• Federal Fiscal Year:
  1988
• Performing Organization:
  Michigan Cancer Foundation, Detroit, Michigan
• Peer Reviewed:
  False
• Start Date:
  19840928
• Source Full Name:
  American Journal of Industrial Medicine
• End Date:
  19940929
• Collection(s):
  National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health
• Main Document Checksum:
  urn:sha-512:2dd1b529a230d64f3a20a49c3efc1b99cd06a879e739ef52c32b084f304a2aadd4f075151f59a5fd630f9c7a52d2089dab0b19c2eb9cc9e0c59368a37677f6f8
• Download URL:
  https://stacks.cdc.gov/view/cdc/205222/cdc_205222_DS1.pdf
• File Type:
  [PDF - 135.59 KB ]