Principal Investigator(s): United States Department of Health and Human Services. National Center for Health Statistics

Summary: The basic purpose of the National Health Interview Survey (NHIS) is to obtain information about the amount and distribution of illness, its effects in terms of disability and chronic impairments, and the kinds of health services people receive. Household variables in this data collection include type of living quarters, size of family, number of families in household, and geographic region. Person variables include sex, age, race, marital status, veteran status, education, income, ... (more info)

Series: National Health Interview Survey Series

• This data is freely available.

• This dataset is maintained and distributed by the National Archive of Computerized Data on Aging (NACDA), the aging program within ICPSR. NACDA is sponsored by the National Institute on Aging (NIA) at the National Institutes of Heath (NIH).

U.S. Dept. of Health and Human Services, National Center for Health Statistics. NATIONAL HEALTH INTERVIEW SURVEY, 1989. Hyattsville, MD: National Center for Health Statistics [producer], 1989. Ann Arbor, MI: Inter-university Consortium for Political and Social Research [distributor], 1991. doi:10.3886/ICPSR09583.v1

Persistent URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.3886/ICPSR09583.v1

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Summary:   The basic purpose of the National Health Interview Survey (NHIS) is to obtain information about the amount and distribution of illness, its effects in terms of disability and chronic impairments, and the kinds of health services people receive. Household variables in this data collection include type of living quarters, size of family, number of families in household, and geographic region. Person variables include sex, age, race, marital status, veteran status, education, income, industry and occupation codes, and limits on activity. The Condition, Doctor Visit, and Hospital files contain information on each reported health condition, doctor visit within two- week period, and hospitalization (12-month recall), respectively.

Subject Terms:   chronic disabilities, chronic illnesses, disabilities, doctor visits, families, health, health care, health care services, health problems, hospitalization, household composition, households, illness

Geographic Coverage:   United States

Time Period:  

• 1989

Date of Collection:  

• 1989

Universe:   Civilian, noninstitutionalized population of the 50 states and the District of Columbia.

Data Types:   survey data

Data Collection Notes:

The supplementary sections of the 1989 questionnaire will be released by the National Center for Health Statistics (NCHS) later as individual files on Health Insurance, Mental Health, Dental Care, Immunization, Diabetes Screening, Diabetes Follow-up, Diabetic Risk Factors, Orofacial Pain, Digestive Disorders, and AIDS Knowledge and Attitudes. Per agreement with NCHS, ICPSR distributes the data file(s) and technical documentation in this collection in their original form as prepared by NCHS. The age distribution for the 1989 Person file is: ages 0-44 (N=80,407), ages 45-54 (N=12,046), ages 55-64 (N=10,231), ages 65-74 (N=8,618), and ages 75+ (N=5,627). The racial/ethnic distributions for the Person file are: Black (N=17,324), Asian/Pacific Islander (N=2,731), and Hispanic origin (N=10,925). The data contain ampersands (&), dashes (-), and blank codes. Frequencies are provided by NCHS in the codebook.

Sample:   Starting in 1985, the NHIS multistage probability sampling from 1,924 geographically defined Primary Sampling Units (PSUs) design incorporated several major changes that facilitate linkages with other National Center for Health Statistics (NCHS) surveys, improve precision of estimates, and reduce costs. Starting with an all-area frame, a reduced number of 201 PSUs was selected, including two from each nonself-representing stratum. Black persons were oversampled. Four independent representative samples, which may be used in any combination, were drawn. One randomly sampled adult per household was asked the 1989 Supplement questions, covering either (1) all persons in the household (Health Insurance, Mental Health, and Dental), (2) all persons aged 18 and over in the household (Immunization and Diabetes Screening [all households], and Diabetic Risk Factors [half the households]) or (3) the sample person only (Orofacial Pain, Digestive Disorders, and AIDS Knowledge and Attitudes). All persons aged 18 and over who were identified as diabetic were asked a Diabetic Follow-up Supplement.

Data Source:

personal interviews

Original ICPSR Release:  1991-10-23

Version History:

• 2006-01-18 File CB9583.ALL.PDF was removed from any previous datasets and flagged as a study-level file, so that it will accompany all downloads.

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