Strategies for Enhancing the Linkage of National Center for Health Statistics' Surveys with Death Indices for Mortality Followup

• Activity Number: 586
• Type: Topic Contributed
• Date/Time: Wednesday, August 7, 2013 : 2:00 PM to 3:50 PM
• Sponsor: Government Statistics Section
• Author(s): Dean Judson*+ and Jennifer D. Parker
• Companies: National Center for Health Statistics and National Center for Health Statistics
• Keywords: record linkage ; linked mortality ; national death index

Abstract

In 2009, the National Center for Health Statistics (NCHS) released the 2006 Linked Mortality Files (LMF), its population health surveys linked to the 2006 National Death Index (NDI). Auxiliary data from the Social Security Administration's Death Master File, data from previous linkages to administrative records from the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, and other direct data collection efforts were used to improve the 2006 LMFs. Extensive research on weighting, scoring, and other aspects of the probabilistic linkage methodology was also performed for the 2006 LMFs. Since then, limitations on surveys' capture of SSNs (9 to 4 digits) may challenge the quality of future NCHS-NDI linkages. However, updated algorithms (e.g., to account for Asian and Hispanic naming conventions) and tools can be applied to the process to improve linkage quality. This presentation will discuss our research efforts to improve the linkage methodology, with attention to the impact of the 4 digit SSNs and new algorithms for names, for the upcoming release in 2013 of the 2010 LMF.