An overview of National Health Measurement Surveys

© Commonwealth of AustraliaThe purpose of this paper is to provide a brief overview of a number of national health surveys that incorporate physical and biochemical measures, and to identify their features and the differences in approaches taken by various countries. These types of health surveys are generally referred to as health measurement or health examination surveys. These surveys are able to provide important information on the prevalence of various health conditions and distributions of physical, mental and biochemical characteristics of the population, as well as providing data on the relationship between risk factors and selected conditions, and social and environmental determinants of health. In Australia, a program of national health measurement surveys has been proposed: the Australian Health Measurement Survey (AHMS) program, and its features are outlined