O'Toole B I, Marshall R P, Grayson D A, Schureck R J, Dobson M, Ffrench M, Pulvertaft B, Meldrum L, Bolton J, Vennard J
Department of Psychiatry, University of Queensland, Royal Brisbane Hospital, Herston, Australia.
Int J Epidemiol. 1996 Apr;25(2):307-18. doi: 10.1093/ije/25.2.307.
The Australian Vietnam Veterans Health Study was set up to examine the post-war health of former soldiers 20 or more years after service and to examine the relation of combat exposure to physical and mental health.
A prospective cohort study of a simple random sample of 1000 male Australian Army Vietnam veterans used information gathered from Army records, from personnel interview and questionnaires. Military records were used to examine response bias by determining the differences between 641 interviewed veterans, 50 known deceased veterans and 309 non-respondents (including 48 refusers and 213 non-traceable).
Differences were evident between respondents and non-respondents, with logistic regression modelling pointing to pre-enlistment employment, antisocial behaviour, intelligence and post-Vietnam AWOL (absent without leave) as the most important discriminants with non-respondents performing worse. Compared to respondents, deceased left school earlier, had higher rank in Vietnam and at discharge, had a higher overall number of charges but not a higher rate overall, and were less likely to have gone AWOL. Deceased also received more casualty reports than respondents and non-respondents, were better behaved during service, and were better emotionally adjusted than non-respondents. Respondents compared with the Australian population had equivalent or better current socioeconomic status.
There seems little bias due to non-response, but deceased tend to come from and older cohort than in the other two groups.
澳大利亚越战退伍军人健康研究旨在调查退伍20年及以上的退伍军人战后健康状况，并研究战斗经历与身心健康之间的关系。
对1000名澳大利亚陆军越战退伍军人男性进行简单随机抽样的前瞻性队列研究，利用从陆军记录、人员访谈和问卷调查中收集的信息。通过确定641名接受访谈的退伍军人、50名已知死亡的退伍军人和309名未回复者（包括48名拒绝者和213名无法追踪者）之间的差异，利用军事记录来检查回复偏差。
回复者和未回复者之间存在明显差异，逻辑回归模型表明入伍前就业、反社会行为、智力和越战后期擅离职守是最重要的判别因素，未回复者情况更差。与回复者相比，死亡者更早离开学校，在越南及退伍时军衔更高，总体指控数量更多但总体比率不高，擅离职守的可能性更小。死亡者收到的伤亡报告也比回复者和未回复者多，服役期间表现更好，情绪调整比未回复者更好。与澳大利亚人口相比，回复者目前的社会经济地位相当或更好。
未回复导致的偏差似乎很小，但死亡者往往比其他两组年龄更大。
