Sepsis Research Today is a free monthly online journal that collates and summarizes the latest research about Sepsis, including details on septicemia, diagnosis, symptoms, treatment.

Using multiple cause-of-death data to investigate associations and causality between conditions listed on the death certificate.

Redelings MD, Wise M, Sorvillo F

Data Collection and Analysis Unit, Los Angeles County Department of Public Health, Los Angeles, CA 90012, USA. mredelings@ph.lacounty.gov

Death rarely results from only one cause, and it can be caused by a variety of factors. Multiple cause-of-death data files can list as many as 20 contributing causes of death in addition to the reported underlying cause of death. Analysis of multiple cause-of-death data can provide information on associations between causes of death, revealing common combinations of events or conditions which lead to death. Additionally, physicians report the causal train of events through which they believe that different conditions or events may have led to each other and ultimately caused death. In this paper, the authors discuss methods used in studying associations between reported causes of death and in investigating commonly reported causal pathways between events or conditions listed on the death certificate.

Published 14 June 2007 in Am J Epidemiol, 166(1): 104-8.
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