Mortality rate is a measure of the number of deaths (in general, or due to a specific cause) in some population, scaled to the size of that population, per unit time. Mortality rate is typically expressed in units of deaths per 1000 individuals per year; thus, a mortality rate of 9.5 in a population of 100,000 would mean 950 deaths per year in that entire population. It is distinct from morbidity rate, which refers to the number of individuals in poor health during a given time period (the prevalence rate) or the number who currently have that disease (the incidence rate), scaled to the size of the population.

One distinguishes:

  1. The crude death rate, the total number of deaths per year per 1000 people. The crude death rate for the whole world is currently about 8.24 per 1000 per year according to the current CIA World Factbook.
  2. The perinatal mortality rate, the sum of neonatal deaths and fetal deaths (stillbirths) per 1000 births.
  3. The maternal mortality rate, the number of maternal deaths due to childbearing per 100,000 live births.
  4. The infant mortality rate, the number of deaths of children less than 1 year old per 1000 live births.
  5. The child mortality rate, the number of deaths of children less than 5 years old per 1000 live births.
  6. The standardised mortality rate (SMR)- This represents a proportional comparison to the numbers of deaths that would have been expected if the population had been of a standard composition in terms of age, gender, etc..[1]
  7. The age-specific mortality rate (ASMR) - This refers to the total number of deaths per year per 1000 people of a given age (e.g. age 62 last birthday).

In regard to the success or failure of medical treatment or procedures, one would also distinguish:

  1. The early mortality rate, the total number of deaths in the early stages of an ongoing treatment, or in the period immediately following an acute treatment.
  2. The late mortality rate, the total number of deaths in the late stages of an ongoing treatment, or a significant length of time after an acute treatment.

Note that the crude death rate as defined above and applied to a whole population can give a misleading impression. The crude death rate depends on the age (and gender) specific mortality rates and the age (and gender) distribution of the population. The number of deaths per 1000 people can be higher for developed nations than in less-developed countries, despite life expectancy being higher in developed countries due to standards of health being better. This happens because developed countries typically have a completely different population age distribution, with a much higher proportion of older people, due to both lower recent birth rates and lower mortality rates. A more complete picture of mortality is given by a life table which shows the mortality rate separately for each age. A life table is necessary to give a good estimate of life expectancy.

Contents

Show All>>

 

The above information uses material from Wikipedia and is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License.
Some facts may not have been fully verified for accuracy. [Disclaimers]
This page was last archived by our server on Tue Jan 5 07:25:20 2010. [ refresh local cache ]
Displaying this page or its contents does not use any Wikimedia Foundation's resources.
The owners of this site proudly support the Wikimedia Foundation.

[Hide]▼
'Mortality Rate' News
Country profile: Haiti - Aljazeera.net
news.google.com
Country profile: Haiti

Aljazeera.net

Nearly 70 per cent of the country's people live on less than $2 a day, and Haiti's literacy rate is 45 per cent. There is a high infant mortality rate and ...

Factbox: Quake-stricken Haiti Reuters

Indifference, not quake, has ravaged Haiti GulfNews

Va. Beach doctor in Haiti assists in earthquake relief The Virginian-Pilot

Catholic Online  - MWC News  - The Guardian

all 12,317 news articles »
Google News Search: Mortality rate,
Fri Jan 15 06:13:33 2010
[Hide]▲