2009, Copenhagen, Denmark

The conference was organized by Henrik Brønnum-Hansen, National Institute of Public Health University of Southern Denmark, and Bernard Jeune, Danish Aging Research Center, Institute of Public Health, University of Southern Denmark.

The overall theme of the conference "Reducing gaps in health expectancy" reflects that one main objective of REVES is to study and quantify differences in health expectancy between men and women as well as inequalities between socioeconomic groups and subpopulations of different ethnicity. The conference deals with these subjects together with studies focusing on international comparisons, trends, health among the oldest old and other topics. A special session on basic concepts and methods brushes up on what it’s all about. The conference presents a general view and provides the opportunity for a discussion on measuring disability, classification systems, estimation methods, statistical considerations and available software. The training session was offered on the day before the conference with presentations and exercises using specific software tools.

The available slides of the presentations are accessible hereunder by clicking on the author’s name.

Photos of the conference

Optional training session: Hands on session for computing health expectancy

• Overview of multi-state life table methods (C Jagger , F Mattews)
• Application of Bayesian Statistic for computing HE (1) (S Lynch, S Brown)
• Application of Bayesian Statistic for computing HE (2) (S Lynch, S Brown)
• Using SAS Macro for computing HE (1) (L Cai )
• Using SAS Macro for computing HE (2) (L Cai)

Session 1: Harmonization and International comparisons

• C Jagger , JM Robine, H Van Oyen and the EHLEIS team. A comparison of health expectancies in the EU25: results from the EHLEIS project.
• O Ekholm and H Brønnum-Hansen. Cross-national comparisons of non-harmonized Healthy Life Years indicators may lead to more confusion than clarification.
• NK Rasmussen . Cross cultural comparability of questionnaire based data used for health expectancy calculations.
• M Smith and C White. An investigation into the impact of question change on estimates of general health status and healthy life expectancy in the United Kingdom.

Session 2: Gender

• WJ Nusselder . Decomposition of gender differences in Healthy Life Years.
  
• H Van Oyen , B Cox, JM Robine and C Jagger for the EHEMU-team. Patterns in gender gaps in the EU.
• L Frova , A Battisti and A Burgio. Are gaps in disability free life expectancies reducing in Italy?
• RS Goyal. Whether the poverty of women in childhood and adult ages affect their health disability status in later years? [Cancelled]

Session 3: Methods - measures, models, simulations

• A Andreotti, N Minicuci, P Kowal and S Chatterji. Multidimensional profiles of health status: An application of the grade of membership model to the World Health Survey.
• F Matthews and A van den Hout. The shape of life and healthy life expectancies.
• X Liu , CC Engel, H Kang and KL Gore. Reducing selection bias in analyzing longitudinal health data with high mortality rates.
• L Cai . Health-adjusted value of health care spending on the elderly in the United States, 1992-2002.

Session 4: Projections, forecasts and scenarios

• D Banham . Targeting health expectancy gaps in South Australia.
• M Lagergren , M Thorslund and M Parker. Revised projections of the development of LTC costs in Sweden 2005-2040.
• R Matthews , C Jagger and MRC CFAS. Trends in disease and how they will impact on disability in the older population.
• KJ Anstey and the DYNOPTA collaborators. Pooling longitudinal studies of ageing for epidemiological analysis and to model health futures: the DYNOPTA project.

Session 5: Basic concepts and methods

• K Avlund . How to measure disability, the disablement process and early signs of disability.
• C Mathers . The disability process and WHO classification systems: past, present and future.
• F Matthews . Estimation and statistically considerations.
• Y Saito . Software overview.

George Myers lecture by James W Vaupel

Session 6: Oldest old and healthy aging

• LA Gavrilov and NS Gavrilova. Physical characteristics at the midlife and survival to age 100: A study of American men.
• H Engberg , A Oksuzyan, B Jeune, JW Vaupel and K Christensen. Healthy aging in Danish centenarians - a 29 year follow-up of hospitalizations among 40,000 Danes in the 1905 birth cohort.
• T Sarkeala , M Vuorisalmi, A Hervonen and M Jylhä. Functional status among Finnish nonagenarians in 1996-2007: Vitality 90+ Study, Tampere.
• VM Shkolnikov , EM Andreev, P Demakakos, A Oksuzyan, K Christensen, MA Shkolnikova and JW Vaupel. Patterns of grip strength in Moscow as compared to Denmark and England.

Session 7: Trends I

• JW Bruggink . Health expectancies in the Netherlands since 1981.
• CH Van Gool, HSJ Picavet, DJH Deeg, MMY de Klerk, WJ Nusselder, MPJ van Boxtel A Wong and N Hoeymans. Trends in late-life activity limitations: The Dutch population between 1990 and 2007.
• SL Reynolds and EM Crimmins. Trends in the ability to work among the older US working population, 1997-2007.

Session 8: Social, ethnic and other differences

• DC Brown , MD Hayward, JK Montez, MM Hidajat and RA Hummer. The significance of education for rectangularization of the survival curve in the United States.
• R Wilkins . The Canadian census mortality follow-up study: a new resource for the study of socioeconomic disparities in health expectancies.
• K Knoops , JW Bruggink and M van den Brakel. Healthy life expectancy and socioeconomical status in the Netherlands.
• A Burlison . Healthy life expectancy in Scotland.
• Z Zimmer , M Wen and T Kaneda. A multi-level analysis of urban versus rural differences in functional status transition among older Chinese.

Session 9: Risk factors, chronic diseases and disability

• L Bonneux , M Reuser and F Willekens. Disability trajectories and life style. A longer life in good health is closed by a longer period in more severe disability.
• B Klijs . Contribution of chronic diseases to the burden of disability in the Netherlands.
• N Brouard, M Espagnacq, JF Ravaud and the Tetrafigap group. Life expectancy of tetraplegic spinal cord injured individuals in France: a ten years follow-up.
• C Himes . The effects of obesity on disability recovery.

Session 10: Trends II

• MG Parker , B Meinow, P Schön and M Thorslund. Health trends in Sweden 1992-2002: Gender and complex health problems.
• LH Chen . Disability-free life expectancy trends in Taiwan: Compression, expansion or dynamic equilibrium.
• SLK Cheung and SFP Yip. Are we heading to the compression of disability? The case of Hong Kong SAR, 1984-2008.
• I Pool , W Boddington, J Cheung and R Didham. Differential trends in mortality compression: Assessing the antecedents to gaps in health expectancy in New Zealand.