This Web site was created to help instructors and students obtain statistical data on a variety of health issues.
Much of the statistical data for this Web site was gathered by the U.S. Government's Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), located in Atlanta, Georgia. The CDC collects health statistics for the entire United States and reports the data (and often discussions of its meaning) in a variety of ways, the most comprehensive and authoritative of which are:
Data from these sources are the best to use for research. Health statistics for the entire world can be found at The World Health Organization. The single-most authoritative and comprehensive source of information on any medical topic can be found at MedlinePlus, produced by the U.S. National Library of Medicine.
The health statistics presented in this section generally address the following:
- Morbidity: how many people are affected by a particular health issue, for example, the number of people or percentage of the population with diabetes.
- Mortality: how many people die because of a particular health issue, for example, the number of people or percentage of the population who die of heart disease.
- Incidence: : the number of reported cases per year (not all incidents are reported), for example, the number of people who contract pneumonia in a given year.
- Prevalence: the total number of cases within the population, for example, the number of Americans who test positive for herpes simplex infection.
Statistics reported in a given year, for example 2006, are often based on research carried out 1–3 years previously. This is due to the extensive time required to analyze and report the data. In some instances, health statistics may be several years old because no new studies have been conducted. In this situation, the older data are accepted for analysis as no other reliable data exist.
This site was created by Eric Golanty and Gordon Edlin, authors of Health and Wellness, Ninth Edition.