This study was undertaken to collect and collate the data on sickness status. Fifty-three, studies were examined, in terms of the items, such as, age, sex, age and sex, area, cause specific prevalence rates, and age, area specific incidence rates, and annual number of sickness per capita, days activity restricted, and ten leading causes of morbidity.
The original attempt to provide representative figures for each of the above items is not satisfactorily achieved owing to the big difference in the range of data. This stems from the following reasons.
1) The definition of morbid conditions is not operationalized.
2) Lack of serious concern on sampling design makes substantial sampling errors. 3) Interviewers may not be selected,´ trained and supervised in an appropriate way_
These thing need to be standardized.
4) Questionnaire error may be substantial.
5) Response error should be considered.
6) Inaccurate diagnoses create problems.
7) There is no uniformity in counting the multi-diagnosis cases. 8) Errors come from calculation and tabulation.
9) The official statistics are markedly underreported.
The following findings are abstracted with the above constraints in mind.
1) Teenagers and productive age group show lower morbidity rates. The distribution
of age specific prevalence rate looks like=U-shaped curve.
2) The mean value of prevalence rate per 1,000 people is around 160. The female
show a higher prevalence rate than the male by 15 to 20. 3) The prevalence rate of urban people seems to be higher than that of the rural, but more information is, required to verify the statement. 4) The average number of annual sickness per person is _1. g´ _to 2.
5) It can be safely stated that the average days of activity restriction per person per month is 0.5 and those of activity restriction per patient is 3.4. 6) The prevalence and incidence rate surveyed on the first day of study are remark
ably higher than those on the last day of study. r 7) The prevalence rate of chronic diseases is much higher than the incidence rate of
acute diseases, which indicates the existence of a large volume of chronic conditions. 8) Seasonal variation is noted in the ten leading causes of morbidity: The diseases of
the digestive system are the leading cause in summer, while diseases of the respiratory tracts in winter.
9.) The official statistics tell us that the incidence rates of acute communicable diseases are rapidly diminishing except typhoid fever.
This study stresses after an investigation of the existing literatures to establish national norms on the measurement of diseases and to standardize survey research
methods concerning the implementation of a morbidity study.
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