Update and validation of a national health risk appraisal tool in Korea.

BACKGROUND

Health risk appraisal (HRA) is an effective tool for lifestyle modification. We updated a national HRA using Robbins' method and tested its validity for predicting mortality.

METHODS

We used various national statistical data (such as life tables and mortality rates) to construct a Geller-Gesner table and referred to well-designed cohort studies to calculate composite risks. We compiled an HRA age table from these data and calculated health age (HA). To test the validity of this HRA, we compared the difference in 8-year mortality among different chronological age and health age (CA-HA) categories and used age-adjusted, sex-specific Cox proportional hazard models to investigate the association between CA-HA and all-cause mortality.

RESULTS

There was a significant difference in mortality according to CA-HA category, and the Cox proportional hazard model showed that as CA-HA decreased from ≥2 to ≤-6, the cumulative survival rate was significantly decreased.

CONCLUSIONS

This HRA can be an effective tool for detecting people at risk and for motivating lifestyle modification in Korea.