Top Causes of Years of Potential Life Lost by Race/Ethnicity

New York Finger Lakes Region (2013 - 2015)

Focusing on the causes of premature mortality for men shows a similar pattern to the overall data. The African-American YPLL rates are significantly higher for several of the top causes of death. In addition, it is striking that for African-American men, the YPLL rate from homicide is only slightly lower than the top cause, heart disease. For Latino men, YPLL rates for top causes such as heart disease, cancer and drug overdoses are a little higher than for white (not Latino) men.

 

Methodology note: The SES index ranking was developed by Common Ground Health and calculated using a variety of socioeconomic indicators from the American Community Survey including average income, poverty rates, education levels, housing value, and homeownership. Each ZIP code is assigned a socioeconomic (SES) index ranking from 1 to 5. The lower SES ZIP codes tend to have lower average income, higher poverty rates, lower prevalence of college degrees, etc.

Methodology note: Years of potential life lost (YPLL) is a widely used measure to assess the rate of premature mortality. YPLL places a larger weight on the deaths of younger people, in contrast with overall mortality statistics which are dominated by deaths of the elderly. The YPLL rates in Common Ground Health analyses are derived using 75 years as the baseline. A death at age 65 has YPLL of 10, where as a death at age 35 has a YPLL of 40. The rates are calculated per 100,000 population and are age-sex adjusted to account for differences in population distribution.

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