Quality of survey informants' reports about death: verification of dates through a record check.

To determine whether relatives and others can provide valid information about the dates of survey respondents' deaths, informants' reports were compared with death certificates for 328 deceased respondents from the MESA study of older adults. About two-thirds (64.6%) of the informants accurately reported the complete date of death. A somewhat larger percentage (70.4%) correctly reported the day of death, whereas 86.9% and 89.6% remembered the year and month, respectively. The percentage of correct reports varies by the relationship between informant and respondent. Also, the findings suggest that women are more accurate reporters than are men, and that the percentage of accurate reports is greater for longer-term relationships.