Linked Birth/Infant Death Data, 1997 Birth Cohort

<p>The 1997 birth cohort linked file includes several separate data files. The first file includes linked birth and death certificate data for all US infants born in 1997 who died before their first birthday - referred to as the numerator file. The second file contains information from the death certificate for all US infant death records which could not be linked to their corresponding birth certificates - referred to as the unlinked death file. The third file is the 1997 NCHS natality file for the US with a few minor modifications - referred to as the denominator-plus file. These same three data files are also available for Puerto Rico, the Virgin Islands, and Guam. For the denominator-plus file, selected variables from the numerator file have been added to the denominator file to facilitate processing. These variables include age at death (and recodes), underlying cause of death (and the 61-cause recode), place of accident, and record weight. These variables are the most widely used variables from the numerator file. With the previous file format it was sometimes necessary to combine the numerator and denominator files when performing certain multivariate statistical techniques. Now, when the number of variables required from the numerator file is limited, the denominator-plus file may be used by itself for ease of programming. Infant death identification numbers are also included, so that the same infant can be uniquely identified and matched between the numerator and denominator-plus files.</p>