Quantifying cause-related mortality incorporating multiple causes: challenges and opportunities

Mortality statistics are typically based on a single underlying cause of death (UCoD), derived from multiple conditions on the death certificate, and have provided critical evidence for policy and practice for over a century. There have been radical shifts in patterns of death in the past couple of decades; deaths in older ages are increasingly from chronic and degenerative diseases. The relevance of assuming that a single disease is causing the death is diminishing, especially with an aging population structure and increasing life expectancy. This symposium will enable participants to understand the complexities associated with mortality reporting/coding, strengths and limitations of available statistical methods for using multiple causes of death (MCoD) and the importance of quantifying mortality incorporating MCoD