DOI: 10.3886/icpsr08719.v4
title: National Health Interview Survey: Longitudinal Study of Aging, 70 Years and Over, 1984-1990
title: Version 4

description: This study, commonly known as the Longitudinal Study of Aging (LSOA), was conducted by the National Center for Health Statistics (NCHS) in collaboration with the National Institute on Aging (NIA) and designed to (1) provide mortality rates by demographic, social, economic, and health characteristics that are not available from the vital statistics system, (2) measure change in the functional status and living arrangements of older people, and (3) provide measures of health care use. It was also designed to describe the continuum from functionally independent living in the community through dependence, possible institutionalization, and finally death. The LSOA is an extension of the National Health Interview Survey (NHIS) of 1984, following its sample of 16,148 noninstitutionalized elderly people (55 years and over) living in the United States, with a special focus on those who were 70 years and over in 1984. This release of the LSOA contains data on those respondents who had been 70 years and older at the time of their 1984 interviews. The data include 1986, 1988, and 1990 reinterviews, National Death Index matches from 1984-1989, and 1987 interviews with contact persons named by decedents, as well as selected variables from the 1984 NHIS core questionnaire and its two supplements, Health Insurance and the Supplement on Aging (SOA). Two Medicare files are also included: Part 2, Medicare Hospital Records, and Part 3, Other Medicare Use Records (which covers home health care, hospice, and outpatient use). Links also are provided to allow merging of additional variables from the NATIONAL HEALTH INTERVIEW SURVEY, 1984 (ICPSR 8659).
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: Person 
 DS2: Medicare Hospital Records 
 DS3: Other Medicare Use Records
description: National Health Interview Survey Series
description: The current release of this collection is NCHS's Version 5 of the LSOA.
The codebooks with frequencies, data collection instrument, and new record layouts for Version 5 of the LSOA are provided as a Portable Document Format (PDF) file.
Per agreement with NCHS, ICPSR distributes the data file(s) and text of the technical documentation for this collection in their original form as prepared by NCHS.
The age distribution of the sample of 7,527 persons in 1984 was: ages 70-74 (N = 3,131), 75-79 (N = 2,306), 80-84 (N = 1,266), and 85-99 (N = 824).
description: Persons who in 1984 were 70 years and older and living in the community.
description: The sample for the LSOA was drawn in stages. First, in 1984, all SOA households with a person aged 80 or over ("oldest old") were selected. Within these households, all person aged 80 or over and their relatives aged 70-79 were selected. Second, all other households with a person aged 70-79 were selected. From these households, all Black persons and their relatives aged 70-79 were selected. Finally, the remaining households with a person aged 70-79, whose residents were all either White or other non-Black persons, were randomly sorted, and one-half of the households were selected for the sample. If more than one person aged 70-79 resided in a household that was selected, all were included. The 1986 sample was reduced in size, but 1988 and 1990 data collection expanded to trace all the original respondents 70 years and older.