Technical notes

Abbreviations
ABS Australian Bureau of Statistics
ACAM Australian Centre for Airways disease Monitoring
AIDS acquired immune deficiency syndrome
AIHW Australian Institute of Health and Welfare
COPD chronic obstructive pulmonary disease
HIV human immunodeficiency virus
ICD-10 International Classification of Diseases and Related Health Problems, 10th revision
NISU National Injury Surveillance Unit
OECD Organisation of Economic Cooperation and Development
PAD  potentially avoidable deaths
PYLL  potential years of life lost
SCRGSP  Steering Committee for the Review of Government Service Provision
SIDS sudden infant death syndrome
WHO  World Health Organisation
YLL years of life lost

Source data

Source data for Premature mortality in Australia 1997–2012.

Cause of Death Unit Record File data are provided to the AIHW by the Registries of Births, Deaths and Marriages and the National Coronial Information System (managed by the Victorian Department of Justice) and include cause of death coded by the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS). The data are maintained by the AIHW in the National Mortality Database.

Deaths registered in 2010 and earlier are based on the final version of cause of death data; deaths registered in 2011 and 2012 are based on revised and preliminary versions, respectively and are subject to further revision by the ABS. In particular, some of the deaths classified as event of undetermined intent are likely to be re-coded by the ABS to more specific causes as more information become available in the National Coronial Information System.

Causes of death presented in this report are based on underlying causes of death. Year refers to year of registration of death. Cause of death information in the National Mortality Database has been coded according to the International Statistical Classification of Diseases and Related Health Problems, 10th revision (ICD-10) since 1997. For comparison over time, most trend analyses presented in this report are restricted to available ICD-10 data (1997–2012).

General Record of Incidence of Mortality (GRIM) books

GRIM books are Excel workbooks that house historical and recent deaths data for specific causes of death in a readily accessible and easy to use format. They refer to different years for different causes of death, depending on the data availability, with some GRIM books starting at 1907. The workbooks present age- and sex-specific counts and rates of deaths along with other summary measures including mean age at death, age-standardised death rates and potential years of life lost.

These workbooks are the only national level electronic source of readily available tabulations of deaths data for deaths registered prior to 1964. Data from 1964 onwards are sourced from the AIHW National Mortality Database.

GRIM books are available for 15 leading causes of premature mortality: General Record of Incidence Mortality (GRIM) books