Version 1
: Received: 30 December 2022 / Approved: 4 January 2023 / Online: 4 January 2023 (01:54:29 CET)
Version 2
: Received: 20 February 2023 / Approved: 22 February 2023 / Online: 22 February 2023 (14:30:30 CET)
Miles, T.P.; Li, C.; Khan, M.M.; Bayakly, R.; Carr, D. Estimating Prevalence of Bereavement, Its Contribution to Risk for Binge Drinking, and Other High-Risk Health States in a State Population Survey, 2019 Georgia Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance Survey. Int. J. Environ. Res. Public Health2023, 20, 5837.
Miles, T.P.; Li, C.; Khan, M.M.; Bayakly, R.; Carr, D. Estimating Prevalence of Bereavement, Its Contribution to Risk for Binge Drinking, and Other High-Risk Health States in a State Population Survey, 2019 Georgia Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance Survey. Int. J. Environ. Res. Public Health 2023, 20, 5837.
Miles, T.P.; Li, C.; Khan, M.M.; Bayakly, R.; Carr, D. Estimating Prevalence of Bereavement, Its Contribution to Risk for Binge Drinking, and Other High-Risk Health States in a State Population Survey, 2019 Georgia Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance Survey. Int. J. Environ. Res. Public Health2023, 20, 5837.
Miles, T.P.; Li, C.; Khan, M.M.; Bayakly, R.; Carr, D. Estimating Prevalence of Bereavement, Its Contribution to Risk for Binge Drinking, and Other High-Risk Health States in a State Population Survey, 2019 Georgia Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance Survey. Int. J. Environ. Res. Public Health 2023, 20, 5837.
Abstract
The BRFSS is an annual survey conducted by each state and designed to identify trends in a representative sample of the resident population. In its 2019 field survey, the U.S. state of Georgia tested a new 3 – item module to measure the numbers of bereaved, resident adults. Bereavement means that participants answered, ‘Yes’ to the item ‘Have you experi-enced the death of a family member or close friend in the years 2018 or 2019?’. This analysis addresses two questions. Can estimates for bereavement prevalence be derived without large sampling errors, low precision, and small subsamples? Can multiple imputation techniques be applied to overcome non-response and missing data to support multivari-ate modeling? Analyses in this study were conducted under two scenarios. Scenario 1 ap-plies the complex sample weights created by the Centers for Disease Control and imputes values for missing responses. Scenario 2 treats the data as a panel – no weighting com-bined with removal of persons with missing data. Scenario 1 reflects the use of BRFSS data for public health and policy, while Scenario 2 reflects data as it is commonly used in so-cial science research. The bereavement item has a response rate (RR) of 70.8% (5206 of 7534 persons). Subgroups have RR of 55% or more. Under Scenario 1, the prevalence of bereavement is 45.38%, meaning that 3,739,120 adults reported bereaved in 2018 or 2019. The prevalence is 46.02% with Scenario 2 which removes persons with any missing data (4,289 persons). Scenario 2 overestimates the bereavement prevalence by 1.39%. An il-lustrative logistic model is included to show the performance of exposure to bereavement under each scenario. Recent bereavement can be ascertained in a surveillance survey without biases in response. This survey is limited to one US state in a single year and ex-cludes persons aged 17 years and younger.
Keywords
BRFSS; Bereavement; Grief; Mental Health; Physical Health; Population Surveillance; Social de-terminants of health; Multiple Imputation; Screening
Subject
Medicine and Pharmacology, Psychiatry and Mental Health
Copyright:
This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
