Direct estimation of cause-specific mortality fractions from verbal autopsies: multisite validation study using clinical diagnostic gold standards.

ABSTRACT:

Background

Verbal autopsy (VA) is used to estimate the causes of death in areas with incomplete vital registration systems. The King and Lu method (KL) for direct estimation of cause-specific mortality fractions (CSMFs) from VA studies is an analysis technique that estimates CSMFs in a population without predicting individual-level cause of death as an intermediate step. In previous studies, KL has shown promise as an alternative to physician-certified verbal autopsy (PCVA). However, it has previously been impossible to validate KL with a large dataset of VAs for which the underlying cause of death is known to meet rigorous clinical diagnostic criteria.

Methods

We applied the KL method to adult, child, and neonatal VA datasets from the Population Health Metrics Research Cons

SUBMITTER: Flaxman AD 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC3160928 | biostudies-literature | 2011 Aug

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature