National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey

Intro and Overview

The National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES) collects information from both interviews and physical examinations to assess the health and nutritional status of the population. The survey is conducted annually and includes about 5,000 persons in each year. NHANES data are used to set standards for height, weight and blood pressure. Though the survey has existed since the 1960s, a major redesign was undertaken in 1999 making data from earlier years less comparable to the present survey. The survey includes many topics, but those likely to be of particular interest for SSA projects include:

a disability status measure
functioning measures
food security
housing characteristics
income

Linkages to SSA data up through the 2007 survey, and restricted-use data access are feasible.

Tips for Getting Started

The CDC NHANES webpage has an extensive set of tutorials Links to an external site. that were updated in December 2019. They walk through replications of data brief estimates in SAS, Stata and R. Some modules are still under construction. These tutorials include examples of statistic analysis.

Key Advantages

Includes a physical exam
Detailed information about food security/insecurity

Key Disadvantages

Geographic identifiers are not available on public use files
Other variables are restricted use only, but NHANES has a really nice variable search tool Links to an external site. available to help you determine which variables are restricted use and find information relevant to your project.

Papers Using these Data

A selected bibliography is available here. Links to an external site.