Marital history, health and mortality among older men and women in England and Wales

BMC Public Health

Table 1 Distribution of men and women aged 60-79 in 1991 by marital, socio-demographic and health characteristics used in the analysis, 1991 and 2001.

		1991		2001
	Men	Women	Men	Women
Age: mean (SD)	67.98 (5.43)	68.76 (5.58)	76.42 (4.85)	77.52 (5.21)
Marital status/history 1971-91/1971-2001
1st marriage -long term (pre 1971)	68.68	47.87	60.68	31.46
1^st marriage since 1971	0.86	0.42	0.98	0.30
All in 1 ^st marriage	69.54	48.29	61.66	32.40
Remarried - long term (pre 1971)	5.53	2.44	3.95	1.26
Remarried since 1971, previously widowed	2.18	1.47	2.72	1.59
Remarried since 1971, previously divorced	2.48	2.57	2.20	1.46
All remarried	10.19	6.48	8.87	3.60
Widowed- long term (pre 1971)	0.79	5.16	0.46	4.03
Widowed- intermediate (1971-81/1971-91^a)	2.20	10.21	6.61	26.04
Widowed- recent (post 1981/91^b)	7.69	19.41	13.16	23.89
All widowed	10.68	34.78	20.23	54.29
Divorced- long term (pre 1971)	0.57	1.25	0.43	1.03
Divorced- intermediate (1971-81/post 1971^c)	1.74	2.08	3.41	3.07
Divorced- recent (post 1981)	1.00	0.79
All divorced	3.41	4.12	3.84	3.75
Never-married	6.17	6.34	5.40	5.87
Socio-economic indicators
Educational qualification (1971)	13.73	8.25	16.07	9.22
Tenure/car score 1971-91, mean (SD)	5.85 (3.22)	5.31 (3.32)	6.32 (3.04)	5.68 (3.26)
Social class score 1971-81, mean (SD)	3.94 (1.45)	--	4.11 (1.40)	--
Owner occupier (2001)			73.57	65.48
Has long-term illness	34.97	31.85	52.09	55.97
N	33,686	41,341	17,997	26,541

^a1971-81 in analysis of 1991-2001 mortality and 1991 long-term illness; 1971-91 in 2001 analysis.
^b 1981-91 in analysis of 1991-2001 mortality and 1991 long-term illness; 1991-2001 in 2001 analysis.
^c 1971-81 in analysis of 1991-2001 mortality and 1991 long-term illness; post 1971 in 2001 analysis

ISSN: 1471-2458