Sensitivity of multiple-cause mortality data for surveillance of deaths associated with head or neck injuries

Multiple-cause mortality data was assessed as a source of information for surveillance of deaths associated with head or neck injuries.

1985-1986 DESCRIPTION OF SYSTEM: Data on causes of death were abstracted from death certificates in New Mexico and coded according to criteria of the International Classification of Diseases, Ninth Revision (ICD-9). Deaths with an external cause-of-death (E) code as the underlying cause of death and one or more head or neck injury nature-of-condition (N) codes as contributing causes of death were considered head or neck injury deaths. These data were compared with data for head or neck injury deaths obtained from computerized records from the New Mexico Office of the Medical Investigator (OMI). Data for alcohol or drug use were abstracted from both systems.

Of the 699 head or neck injury deaths coded by the New Mexico OMI system in 1985-1986, 536 were identified as head or neck injury deaths in multiple-cause mortality data (sensitivity = 76.7%). Firearms were the leading cause of head or neck injury deaths, followed by motor vehicles. Multiple-cause mortality data contained alcohol codes for only 3.7% of OMI records with blood alcohol concentrations > or = 0.10 mg/dL and contained drug codes for none of the OMI records with positive toxicology tests for drugs.

The sensitivity of multiple-cause mortality data was relatively high for surveillance of head and neck injury deaths.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)