National Health Interview Survey: Longitudinal Study of Aging, 70 Years and Over, 1984-1990

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).