NCHStats

In the June issue of the American Journal of Public Health (AJPH), there is a new section called Surveillance and Survey Methods, authored by Denys Lau, PhD, Acting Director, Division of Health Care Statistics that will publish peer-reviewed articles that describe the latest designs and methodological novelties that established programs have adopted to improve data collection, analysis, and dissemination to meet public health surveillance objectives.

Surveillance and survey programs of interest range from those that gather data on major life events and disease onset and progression to those that track health care access, quality, and utilization over time.

In the inaugural issue, Ryne Paulose-Ram, NHANES’ Associate director for science and author of the feature Design Description article that provides an overview of the 2011–2018 NHANES, a flagship population survey conducted by NCHS, with an emphasis on the methodological changes made to oversample Asian Americans.

Since the 1970s, NHANES has monitored the health and nutritional status of adults and children in the United States. Beginning in 2011, NHANES began oversampling Asian Americans to obtain sufficient sample sizes to produce reliable estimates for this subpopulation. The feature article, in a clear and standardized format, describes the design and methods used in NHANES to oversample Asian Americans.

The intent of this section is to publish significant, innovative work that will advance methods in data collection, analysis, and dissemination to meet public health surveillance objectives that will better guide actions and ultimately improve population health.

There is also a podcast interview from AJPH Editor-in-Chief Alfredo Morabia with Denys Lau and Ryne Paulose-Ram regarding this new section.