The NHANES program suspended field operations in March 2020 due to the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic. As a result, data collection for the NHANES 2019-2020 cycle was not completed and the collected data are not nationally representative. Therefore, data collected from 2019 to March 2020 were combined with data from the NHANES 2017-2018 cycle to form a nationally representative sample of NHANES 2017-March 2020 pre-pandemic data. These data are available to the public. Please refer to the Analytic Notes section for more details on the use of the data.
The pesticide use questionnaire (variable name prefix PUQ) provides data on pesticide use during the past seven days in the home, and on the lawn or in the garden.
Pesticides are substances or a mixture of substances intended for preventing, destroying, repelling, or mitigating any pest (EPA, 2020). Many common household products that are used inside and outside of the home are considered pesticides, thus increasing the risk of exposure to these substances. The PUQ seeks to obtain meaningful data about potential exposure to chemicals in and around the household among NHANES participants.
All participants aged 6 years and older, in the NHANES 2017-March 2020 pre-pandemic sample, were eligible.
The PUQ was asked in the mobile examination center (MEC) by phlebotomists or trained interviewers using the Computer-Assisted Personal Interview (CAPI) system.
Persons 18 years of age and older were interviewed directly. A proxy provided information for participants 6-17.
PUQ data were systematically reviewed for consistency, data processing, and data input errors on a periodic basis during the data collection.
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 reviewed by NCHS data analysts for accuracy and completeness.
Data were edited for completeness and consistency.
The COVID-19 pandemic required suspension of NHANES 2019-2020 field operations in March 2020 after data were collected in 18 of the 30 survey locations in the 2019-2020 sample. Data collection was cancelled for the remaining 12 locations. Because the collected data from 18 locations were not nationally representative, these data were combined with data from the previous cycle (2017-2018) to create a 2017-March 2020 pre-pandemic data file. A special weighting process was applied to the 2017-March 2020 pre-pandemic data file. The resulting sample weights in the present file should be used to calculate estimates from the combined cycles. These sample weights are not appropriate for independent analyses of the 2019-2020 data and will not yield nationally representative results for either the 2017-2018 data alone or the 2019-March 2020 data alone. Please refer to the NHANES website for additional information for the NHANES 2017-March 2020 pre-pandemic data, and for the previous 2017-2018 public use data file with specific weights for that 2-year cycle.
Please refer to the NHANES Analytic Guidelines and the on-line NHANES Tutorial for further details on the use of sample weights and other analytic issues.
| Code or Value | Value Description | Count | Cumulative | Skip to Item |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Yes | 1052 | 1052 | |
| 2 | No | 10851 | 11903 | |
| 7 | Refused | 1 | 11904 | |
| 9 | Don't know | 53 | 11957 | |
| . | Missing | 241 | 12198 |
| Code or Value | Value Description | Count | Cumulative | Skip to Item |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Yes | 574 | 574 | |
| 2 | No | 11209 | 11783 | |
| 7 | Refused | 9 | 11792 | |
| 9 | Don't know | 164 | 11956 | |
| . | Missing | 242 | 12198 |