DOI: 10.3886/icpsr08049.v4
title: National Health Interview Survey, 1979
title: Version 4

description: The basic purpose of the Health Interview Survey is to obtain information about the amount and distribution of illness, its effects in terms of disability and chronic impairments, and the kind of health services people receive. There are five core files within the 1979 survey, each in a separate data file. The variables in the Household File (Part 1) include type of living quarters, size of family, region, condition list assigned, and type of PSU. The Person File (Part 2) includes information on sex, age, race, marital status, veteran status, education, income, industry and occupation codes, and limits on activity. The Condition File (Part 3) contains information for each reported health condition, with specifics on injury and accident reports. The Hospital Episode File (Part 4) provides information on medical conditions, hospital episodes, type of service, type of hospital ownership, date of admission and discharge, number of nights in hospital, and operations performed. The Doctor Visit File (Part 5) documents doctor visits within the time period and identifies acute or chronic conditions. A sixth and a seventh data set have been added to the core files. The Home Care Supplement File (Part 6) documents basic demographic information, eating habits, in-home mobility, hospital visits, and the extent that basic living activities and needs are performed with or without aid. Also in the Person file are the Home Care Supplement variables which were used to define the need for personal (individual) home care as a result of a chronic health condition, as well as the use of eyeglasses and contact lenses and hearing aids. The Residential Mobility Supplement File (Part 7) includes basic demographic variables and length of hospital stay, amount of time one has lived at the same residence, and reasons for moving.
description: These data contain multiple weight variables for each part. Users should refer to the User Guide for further information regarding the weights and their derivation. Additionally, users may need to weight the data prior to analysis.
description: ICPSR data undergo a confidentiality review and are altered when necessary to limit the risk of disclosure. ICPSR also routinely creates ready-to-go data files along with setups in the major statistical software formats as well as standard codebooks to accompany the data. In addition to these procedures, ICPSR performed the following processing steps for this data collection: Created online analysis version with question text..
description: Datasets: 
 
 DS0: Study-Level Files 
 DS1: Household 
 DS2: Person 
 DS3: Condition 
 DS4: Hospital Episode 
 DS5: Doctor Visit 
 DS6: Home Care Supplement 
 DS7: Resident Mobility Supplement
description: National Health Interview Survey Series
description: face-to-face interview 
These data files contain weights, which must be used in any analysis.
Per agreement with the National Center for Health Statistics (NCHS), ICPSR distributes the data files and text of the technical documentation for this collection as prepared by NCHS.
The Residential Mobility Supplement (Part 7) contains blanks.
description: Civilian, noninstitutionalized population of the United States and the District of Columbia from 1,900 geographically defined Primary Sampling Units (PSU).
description: A multistage probability sample was used in selecting housing units.