Overview
This interactive set of dashboards describe trends in late-life functioning of the US Medicare population ages 70 and older through 2020. The dashboards are designed to facilitate understanding of how daily life is changing for older adults as the US population ages. Data are from the National Health and Aging Trends Study (NHATS).
Users may view trends for the overall Medicare population ages 70 and older or by various demographic groups. Dashboards below (except End of Life) exclude nursing home residents. See dashboards through 2020 that include nursing home residents for a subset of outcomes.
A companion chart book with key trends, measures and detailed tables and an online description of methods and measures used through 2020 are also available.
More recent dashboards are also available.
Acknowledgments
The NHATS dashboards were prepared with funding from the National Institute on Aging (U01AG032947 and P30AG012846).
Recommended citation: Freedman VA, Cornman JC, Kasper JD. 2021. National Health and Aging Trends Study: Trends Dashboards. Available at www.micda.isr.umich.edu/research/nhats-trends-dashboards.
About NHATS
Begun in 2011, NHATS fosters research to guide efforts to reduce disability, maximize health and independent functioning, and enhance quality of life at older ages. NHATS was designed to provide the basis for understanding trends in late-life functioning, how these differ for various subgroups, and the economic and social consequences of aging and disability for individuals, families, and society.
NHATS gathers annual, in-person information on a nationally representative sample of Medicare beneficiaries ages 65 and older. The sample is refreshed periodically in order to support study of national-level disability trends. Caregivers of NHATS respondents are interviewed in the supplemental National Study of Caregiving (NSOC).
NHATS is being led investigators at the Johns Hopkins University Bloomberg School of Public Health and the University of Michigan’s Institute for Social Research, with data collection by Westat, and support from the National Institute on Aging. Data are available through www.nhats.org.