MRC/CSO Social and Public Health Sciences Unit, University of Glasgow, UK.
Usher Institute, University of Edinburgh, UK.
Scand J Public Health. 2023 Mar;51(2):215-224. doi: 10.1177/14034948211031383. Epub 2021 Aug 14.
It is becoming increasingly possible to obtain additional information about health survey participants, though not usually non-participants, via record linkage. We aimed to assess the validity of an assumption underpinning a method developed to mitigate non-participation bias. We use a survey in Finland where it is possible to link both participants and non-participants to administrative registers. Survey-derived alcohol consumption is used as the exemplar outcome.
Data on participants (85.5%) and true non-participants of the Finnish Health 2000 survey (invited survey sample =7167 aged 30-79 years) and a contemporaneous register-based population sample (=496,079) were individually linked to alcohol-related hospitalisation and death records. Applying the methodology to create synthetic observations on non-participants, we created 'inferred samples' (participants and inferred non-participants). Relative differences (RDs) between the inferred sample and the invited survey sample were estimated overall and by education. Five per cent limits were used to define acceptable RDs.
Average weekly consumption estimates for men were 129 g and 131 g of alcohol in inferred and invited survey samples, respectively (RD -1.6%; 95% confidence interval (CI) -2.2 to -0.04%) and 35 g for women in both samples (RD -1.1%; 95% CI -2.4 to -0.8%). Estimates for men with secondary levels of education had the greatest RD (-2.4%; 95% CI -3.7 to -1.1%).
The sufficiently small RDs between inferred and invited survey samples support the assumption validity and use of our methodology for adjusting for non-participation. However, the presence of some significant differences means caution is required.
通过记录链接，可以越来越多地获取有关健康调查参与者的其他信息，尽管通常无法获取非参与者的信息。我们旨在评估一种方法的假设的有效性，该方法旨在减轻非参与偏倚。我们使用芬兰的一项调查，该调查可以将参与者和非参与者与行政登记册联系起来。调查中得出的酒精摄入量被用作示例结果。
将芬兰健康 2000 调查的参与者（85.5%）和真实非参与者（邀请的调查样本=7167 名年龄在 30-79 岁的人）以及同期基于登记的人群样本（=496079 人）的数据进行个人链接，以获取与酒精相关的住院和死亡记录。应用该方法创建非参与者的综合观测值，我们创建了“推断样本”（参与者和推断的非参与者）。总体和按教育程度估计推断样本与邀请调查样本之间的相对差异（RD）。使用 5%的限制来定义可接受的 RD。
男性的平均每周饮酒量估计值分别为推断样本中的 129 克和邀请调查样本中的 131 克（RD-1.6%；95%置信区间（CI）-2.2 至-0.04%），女性在两个样本中的饮酒量均为 35 克（RD-1.1%；95% CI -2.4%至-0.8%）。具有中等教育水平的男性的 RD 最大（-2.4%；95% CI -3.7%至-1.1%）。
推断样本和邀请调查样本之间的 RD 足够小，支持假设的有效性，并支持我们使用该方法来调整非参与偏倚。然而，存在一些显著差异，这意味着需要谨慎。
