Priority Research Centre for Gender, Health and Ageing, University of Newcastle, Callaghan, NSW 2308, Australia.
Ann Epidemiol. 2010 Apr;20(4):318-21. doi: 10.1016/j.annepidem.2010.01.002. Epub 2010 Feb 11.
To investigate the impact of attrition on prevalence and associations between variables across four waves of a longitudinal study.
Prevalence of socio-demographic and health characteristics were estimated for respondents to one, two, three or all four waves of the Australian Longitudinal Study of Women's Health cohort born between 1973 and 1978. Associations with self-rated General Health (GH) and Mental Health (MH) were compared using fixed effects in separate mixed models for respondents to at least one wave, at least two waves, at least three waves, or four waves of the longitudinal study.
14,247 women aged 18-23 years responded to Wave 1 in 1996. Respondents to all waves were more educated, and less likely to be stressed about money, to be smokers and to have children than respondents to some waves. Across all models, better GH was consistently associated with more education, no monetary stress, being married, having children, fewer visits to the doctor and not smoking. Similar results were obtained for MH.
Although the potential for bias due to attrition must be considered, the current paper contributes to the growing body of evidence that suggests such biases are insufficient to preclude meaningful longitudinal analyses.
调查在一项纵向研究的四波中，人员流失对变量的患病率和相关性的影响。
为了评估澳大利亚妇女健康纵向研究队列中出生于 1973 年至 1978 年的、在第 1 波、第 2 波、第 3 波或第 4 波中至少参加过一波、至少参加过两波、至少参加过三波或参加过四波的受访者的社会人口学和健康特征的患病率。使用至少参加过一波的受访者、至少参加过两波的受访者、至少参加过三波的受访者或参加过四波的受访者的固定效应，在单独的混合模型中比较与自我评估的一般健康（GH）和心理健康（MH）的关联。
1996 年，18-23 岁的 14247 名女性对第 1 波做出了回应。所有波的受访者的受教育程度更高，对金钱的压力较小，吸烟的可能性较小，孩子也较少，而一些波的受访者的受教育程度较低，对金钱的压力较大，吸烟的可能性较大，孩子也较多。在所有模型中，GH 更好与更高的教育程度、没有金钱压力、已婚、有孩子、较少看医生和不吸烟有关。MH 也得到了类似的结果。
尽管由于人员流失可能存在偏差，但本文有助于增加越来越多的证据表明，这种偏差不足以排除有意义的纵向分析。
