Located in the Kassena-Nankana districts of northern Ghana, the Navrongo health and demographic surveillance system (NHDSS) was established in 1992 by the Navrongo health research centre (NHRC). The NHRC is one of three research centres of the Ghana health service. The activities and potential of the NHDSS for collaborative research are described. The NHDSS monitors health and demographic dynamics of the two Kassena-Nankana districts of northern Ghana and facilitates evaluation of the morbidity and mortality impact of health and social interventions. The total population currently under surveillance is 152 000 residing in 32 000 households. Events monitored routinely include pregnancies, births, morbidity, deaths, migration, marriages and vaccination coverage. Data updates are done every 4 months by trained fieldworkers. The NHRC also undertakes biomedical and socio-economic studies. Additional features of the NHDSS include the community key informant system where trained volunteers routinely report key events, such as births and deaths as they occur in their locality and the verbal autopsy (VA) system for determining the probable causes of deaths that occur at the community level. Data from the NHDSS are shared with funders and collaborators and partners in the INDEPTH Network. The Director of the NHDSS is the contact person for potential collaboration with the NHDSS and the use of its data.

BackgroundGhana is experiencing significant increases in its ageing population, yet research on the health and quality of life of older people is limited. Lack of data on the health and well-being of older people in the country makes it difficult to monitor trends in the health status of adults and the impact of social policies on their health and welfare. Research on ageing is urgently required to provide essential data for policy formulation and programme implementation.ObjectiveTo describe the health status and identify factors associated with self-rated health (SRH) among older adults in a rural community in northern Ghana.MethodsThe data come from a survey on Adult Health and Ageing in the Kassena-Nankana District involving 4,584 people aged 50 and over. Survey participants answered questions pertaining to their health status, including self-rated overall health, perceptions of well-being and quality of life, and self-reported assessment of functioning on a range of different health domains. Socio-demographic information such as age, sex, marital status and education were obtained from a demographic surveillance database.ResultsThe majority of older people rated their health status as good, with the oldest old reporting poorer health. Multivariate regression analysis showed that functional ability and sex are significant factors in SRH status. Adults with higher levels of functional limitations were much more likely to rate their health as being poorer compared with those having lower disabilities. Household wealth was significantly associated with SRH, with wealthier adults more likely to rate their health as good.ConclusionThe depreciation in health and daily functioning with increasing age is likely to increase people's demand for health care and other services as they grow older. There is a need for regular monitoring of the health status of older people to provide public health agencies with the data they need to assess, protect and promote the health and well-being of older people.

IntroductionClimate and weather variability can have significant health consequences of increased morbidity and mortality. However, today the impact of climate and weather variability, and consequentially, of climate change on population health in sub-Saharan Africa is not well understood. In this study, we assessed the association of daily temperature and precipitation with daily mortality by age and sex groups in Northern Ghana.MethodsWe analysed daily mortality and weather data from 1995 to 2010. We adopted a time-series Poisson regression approach to examine the short-term association of daily mean temperature and daily mean precipitation with daily mortality. We included time factors and daily lagged weather predictors. The correlation between lagged weather predictors was also considered.ResultsFor all populations, a statistically significant association of mean daily temperature with mortality at lag days 0–1 was observed below and above the 25th (27.48°C) and 75th (30.68°C) percentiles (0.19%; 95% confidence interval CI: 0.05%, 0.21%) and (1.14%; 95% CI: 0.12%, 1.54%), respectively. We also observed a statistically significant association of mean daily temperature above 75th percentile at lag days 2–6 and lag days 7–13 (0.32%; 95% CI: 0.16%, 0.25%) and (0.31% 95% CI: 0.14%, 0.26%), respectively. A 10 mm increase in precipitation was significantly associated with a 1.71% (95% CI: 0.10%, 3.34.9%) increase in mortality for all ages and sex groups at lag days 2–6. Similar results were also observed at lag days 2–6 and 14–27 for males, 2.92% (95% CI: 0.80%, 5.09%) and 2.35% (95% CI: 0.28%, 4.45%).ConclusionShort-term weather variability is strongly associated with mortality in Northern Ghana. The associations appear to differ among different age and sex groups. The elderly and young children were found to be more susceptible to short-term temperature-related mortality. The association of precipitation with mortality is more pronounced at the short-term for all age and sex groups and in the medium short-term among males. Reducing exposure to extreme temperature, particularly among the elderly and young children, should reduce the number of daily deaths attributable to weather-related mortality.

Crude rates such as the crude death rate are functions of both the age-specific rates and the age composition of a population. However, differences in the age structure between two populations or two time periods can result in specious differences in the corresponding crude rates making direct comparisons between populations or across time inappropriate. Therefore, when comparing crude rates between populations, it is desirable to eliminate or minimize the influence of age composition. This task is accomplished by using a standard age structure yielding an age-standardized rate. This paper proposes an updated International Network for the Demographic Evaluation of Populations and Their Health (INDEPTH) standard for use in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs) based on newly available data from the health and demographic surveillance system site members of the INDEPTH network located throughout Africa and southern Asia. The updated INDEPTH standard should better reflect the age structure of LMICs and result in more accurate health indicators and demographic rates. We demonstrate use of the new INDEPTH standard along with several existing ‘world’ standards and show how resulting age-standardized crude deaths rates differ when using the various standard age compositions.

BackgroundMortality from external causes, of all kinds, is an important component of overall mortality on a global basis. However, these deaths, like others in Africa and Asia, are often not counted or documented on an individual basis. Overviews of the state of external cause mortality in Africa and Asia are therefore based on uncertain information. The INDEPTH Network maintains longitudinal surveillance, including cause of death, at population sites across Africa and Asia, which offers important opportunities to document external cause mortality at the population level across a range of settings.ObjectiveTo describe patterns of mortality from external causes at INDEPTH Network sites across Africa and Asia, according to the WHO 2012 verbal autopsy (VA) cause categories. DesignAll deaths at INDEPTH sites are routinely registered and followed up with VA interviews. For this study, VA archives were transformed into the WHO 2012 VA standard format and processed using the InterVA-4 model to assign cause of death. Routine surveillance data also provide person-time denominators for mortality rates.ResultsA total of 5,884 deaths due to external causes were documented over 11,828,253 person-years. Approximately one-quarter of those deaths were to children younger than 15 years. Causes of death were dominated by childhood drowning in Bangladesh, and by transport-related deaths and intentional injuries elsewhere. Detailed mortality rates are presented by cause of death, age group, and sex.ConclusionsThe patterns of external cause mortality found here generally corresponded with expectations and other sources of information, but they fill some important gaps in population-based mortality data. They provide an important source of information to inform potentially preventive intervention designs.

BackgroundMortality from non-communicable diseases (NCDs) is a major global issue, as other categories of mortality have diminished and life expectancy has increased. The World Health Organization's Member States have called for a 25% reduction in premature NCD mortality by 2025, which can only be achieved by substantial reductions in risk factors and improvements in the management of chronic conditions. A high burden of NCD mortality among much older people, who have survived other hazards, is inevitable. The INDEPTH Network collects detailed individual data within defined Health and Demographic Surveillance sites. By registering deaths and carrying out verbal autopsies to determine cause of death across many such sites, using standardised methods, the Network seeks to generate population-based mortality statistics that are not otherwise available.ObjectiveTo describe patterns of adult NCD mortality from INDEPTH Network sites across Africa and Asia, according to the WHO 2012 verbal autopsy (VA) cause categories, with separate consideration of premature (15–64 years) and older (65+ years) NCD mortality.DesignAll adult deaths at INDEPTH sites are routinely registered and followed up with VA interviews. For this study, VA archives were transformed into the WHO 2012 VA standard format and processed using the InterVA-4 model to assign cause of death. Routine surveillance data also provide person-time denominators for mortality rates.ResultsA total of 80,726 adult (over 15 years) deaths were documented over 7,423,497 person-years of observation. NCDs were attributed as the cause for 35.6% of these deaths. Slightly less than half of adult NCD deaths occurred in the 15–64 age group. Detailed results are presented by age and sex for leading causes of NCD mortality. Per-site rates of NCD mortality were significantly correlated with rates of HIV/AIDS-related mortality.ConclusionsThese findings present important evidence on the distribution of NCD mortality across a wide range of African and Asian settings. This comes against a background of global concern about the burden of NCD mortality, especially among adults aged under 70, and provides an important baseline for future work.

This district may be on track to achieve the MDG on maternal health. Ultimately, strengthening vital registration systems to provide timely information to policymakers should supersede the other methods of measuring maternal mortality.

BackgroundUnder-five mortality is a major public health problem and one of the health indicators of health care in sub-Saharan Africa. In order to address inefficient health systems, there is a need to identify the spatial distribution of under-five mortality, especially areas of high mortality clustering. This study aimed to explore spatial and temporal clustering in under-five mortality in the Kassena-Nankana1 District of the Upper East region.MethodsWe used data from the Navrongo Health and Demographic Surveillance System in the Kassena- Nankana District of northern Ghana, which had an average population of 140,000 of which about 18,400 were under five years of age. We analysed under-five mortality in 49 villages during the period 1997–2006. We calculated total under-five mortality rates and investigated their geographical distributions. A spatial scan statistic was used to test for clustering of the mortality in both space and time.ResultsUnder-five mortality has been declining during the period. However, the data show a persistently higher than average clustering of mortality over the period among villages mainly in the north-eastern parts of the district.ConclusionThere is a higher than average under-five mortality clustering in the villages in the north-east of the district and this may suggest a relatively poor health care system despite the many health interventions that took place over time in the district, including the Community Health and Family Planning Project, whose impact may not have been felt in these parts of the district between 1995 and 2004.