• Component Description
• Eligible Sample
• Interview Setting and Mode of Administration
• Quality Assurance & Quality Control
• Data Processing and Editing
• Analytic Notes
• Codebook
  • SEQN - Respondent sequence number
  • RXD300 - Drugs/over counter taken regularly
  • RXD310 - Product taken
  • RXD320 - # years taking product every day
  • RXD330 - Currently taking product every day
  • RXD331Q - # of pills/doses taken/day
  • RXD331U - Unit of measure (pills/doses)
  • RXQ355 - Container seen by interviewer
  • RXQ360G - Strength of product
  • RXQ360Q - Quantity of strength
  • RXQ360U - Unit of strength on bottle

National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey

2003-2004 Data Documentation, Codebook, and Frequencies

Analgesic Pain Relievers (RXQANA_C)

Data File: RXQANA_C.xpt

First Published: June 2008

Last Revised: NA

Component Description

The Dietary Supplements and Prescription Medication Section (DSQ) of the Sample Person (SP) Questionnaire collects information on

1. dietary supplements,
2. nonprescription antacids,
3. pain relievers/analgesics, and
4. prescription medications.

This documentation describes the Analgesic Subsection which provides personal interview data on lifetime and current chronic use of specific prescription and non-prescription pain medications.

Eligible Sample

The eligible sample consisted of participants 20 years of age and older.

Interview Setting and Mode of Administration

These questions were asked before the physical examination, in the home, using the Computer-Assisted Personal Interviewing-CAPI (interviewer administered) system.

Quality Assurance & Quality Control

The CAPI system is programmed with built-in consistency checks to reduce data entry errors. CAPI also uses online help screens to assist interviewers in defining key terms used in the questionnaire. Data were routinely examined for discrepancies and erroneous values.

Data Processing and Editing

Data Collection Methods

During the household interview, respondents were asked a series of questions about lifetime and current chronic use of specific prescription and non-prescription pain medications. Chronic use was defined as “use nearly every day for a month or longer”. Participants were shown a hand card with a list of pain-relieving products (Appendix) and were asked to identify which products, listed on the hand card, that they had taken nearly every day for a month or longer.

Data Editing

RXD300 - Pain Relievers drugs/over counter taken regularly
Participants were asked to report pain relievers taken nearly every day for a month or longer, same as data collected during the later part of the 2001-2002 survey.

RXD310 – Product taken
The ordering of products and inclusion of generic ingredient names were the same as data collected during the later part of the 2001-2002 survey.

RXD320 – Number of years taking product every day
The duration of use of pain relievers was originally reported in months or years. To facilitate analysis, all answers were converted to years. All responses less than 1 year were coded to a value of 666.

RXD330 – Currently taking product every day
Participants were asked whether they have used pain relievers in the past 30 days. Those who provided an affirmative answer were asked follow-up questions to identify which products, listed on the hand card, that they had taken and how many days they had used the product in the past 30 days. Persons who reported the use of a pain reliever and reported using a given product for greater than 21 days were identified as a current chronic pain reliever user in RXD330, same as data collected during the later part of the 2001-2002 survey.

Analytic Notes

This file is a drug product level file. Therefore, participants, who reported the use of multiple pain relieving products, will have a record for each product. Note that these data do not differentiate between prescription and non-prescription analgesics. The analyst should also be aware of the above data editing before analyzing the data.

During the 2003-2004 survey, household interviewers were required to record the strength of each product that survey participant reported to have used in the past 30 days. New variables RXQ355 (container seen by interviewer) and RXQ360Q/G/U (strength of product, quantity of strength, unite of strength on bottle) were first released in the 2003-2004 data file, and would not be found in the earlier data files.

Please refer to the Analytic Guidelines for further details on the use of sample weights and other analytic issues. The Analytic Guidelines are available on the NHANES website.

Codebook and Frequencies