Series details: CRDA/28

The General Household Survey (GHS) is a multi-purpose survey dating from 1971, providing information on aspects of housing, employment, education, health and social services, transport, population and social security. It is a continuous survey based on an achieved sample of about 9,000 households.

The GHS, Elderly follow-up was a pilot study to examine various methodological aspects of the feasibility of carrying out a cohort study, or a series of cohort studies, of the elderly. Comparing successive rounds of the GHS and the Health Survey for England throws some light on health states, but is not nearly as powerful as an approach which looks at changes in health state at the individual level. This follow up survey of GHS respondents is a large scale pilot which collects usable data. A working group on Health Expectancy was set up in 1995 to provide expert help to The Department of Health on the appropriate measures to use in the estimation of health expectancy (the expected number of years of disability-free life). The Working Group advised that health expectancy could not be properly monitored without longitudinal data, because it requires data on transition rates between health states.

It was recommended that the feasibility of collecting these data be investigated by following up and attempting to re-interview respondents aged 65 years and over interviewed in the 1994 General Household Survey (held at the UK Data Archive under SN:3538). The Department of Health commissioned ONS to re-interview approximately 1000 elderly people identified from The National Health Service Central Register, around two and a half years after the GHS interview.

The key data required were those which would enable transition rates between health states to be estimated, but a further aim was to collect information on related issues such as the use of long term care services. The main methodological focus of the pilot survey was to assess the data collection problems in following elderly people and re-interviewing them about their health.

The General Household Survey (GHS) Elderly follow-up is an annual national survey, conducted quarterly, by the Social Survey Division of the Office for National Statistics on behalf of the Department of Health. Prior to April 1996 the surveys were conducted by the Office of Population Censuses and Surveys (in April 1996 the Office of Population Censuses and Surveys and the Central Statistical Office amalgamated to become the Office for National Statistics).

For further information on the Office of Population Censuses and Surveys and the Office for National Statistics, see the Administrative History of the Statistical Departments. Information about the Department of Health is provided in the Administrative History of the Health Departments.

Topics covered in the 1994 General Household Survey: Follow-up Survey of the Health of People aged 65 and over include:

• Household information
• Health state
• EuroQol (standardized non disease-specific instrument for describing and valuing health-related quality of life)
• Sight and hearing
• Mental state
• Mobility and self-care
• Continence
• Getting out
• Aids and alterations
• Domestic tasks
• Informal care
• Use of services
• Smoking and alcohol use
• Income
• Moving home
• Standard Measures

No accruals expected as the 1994 General Household Survey: Follow-up Survey of the Health of People aged 65 and over dataset was a pilot project.

The 1994 General Household Survey: Follow-up Survey of the Health of People aged 65 and over dataset and related dataset documentation are public records under the Public Records Acts 1958 and 1967. The Public Record Office has assigned the datasets the class reference JA6

Fields relating to date of birth and date of death in the 1994 General Household Survey: Follow-up Survey of the Health of People aged 65 and over are closed. The remaining fields and related documentation are open to users of NDAD on demand and do not require to be booked in advance.

The 1994 General Household Survey: Follow-up Survey of the Health of People aged 65 and over dataset and related dataset documentation are subject to Crown Copyright.

The 1994 General Household Survey: Follow-up Survey of the Health of People aged 65 and over dataset is not subject to registration under the Data Protection Act.

The language of the materials is English.

Documents relating to the The General Household Survey: Follow-up Survey of the Health of People aged 65 and over 1994 dataset has been transferred to NDAD. See the Dataset Documentation Catalogue for further details of these items.

The General Household Survey: Follow-up Survey of the Health of People aged 65 and over 1994 is also held at the UK Data Archive, (reference number: 3903). The General Household Survey, 1973 -1997 is held at Essex data archive (reference number: 33090).

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The dataset was transferred to NDAD as a portable SPSS data file, efu17.por. The data was held as one file or table.

The 1994 General Household Survey: Follow-up Survey of the Health of People aged 65 and over dataset is closed in that once the data was entered it was archived and not subsequently overwritten by other data.

Data was collected by means of face-to-face interviews and CAPI computer aided interviewing was used.

Details of the content and transformation validation checks performed by NDAD on the Reasons for Retirement dataset are contained in the catalogues of individual datasets: see Links to dataset catalogues.

Dataset catalogues provide more detailed information about individual datasets, and are currently available for the following dataset(s):