© 2005 American Public Health Association DOI: 10.2105/AJPH.2004.053751
At the time the work was completed, all authors were with the Department of Human Services, Bureau of Health, Augusta, Me. Nancy Sonnenfeld was also with the University of Southern Maine, Portland. Correspondence: Requests for reprints should be sent to Judith Graber, MS, Environmental Health Unit, Maine Bureau of Health, 286 Water St, SHS 11, Augusta ME 04333 (e-mail: judith.graber{at}maine.gov).
We collaborated with Maine American Indian tribes to evaluate racial coding on death certificates and the effects of coding errors on estimation of cardiovascular disease (CVD) mortality. Lists of tribal decedents were matched to death certificates; 38.5% were misclassified (17.8% coding errors; 20.7% data entry errors). After errors were corrected, CVD mortality trends were similar between American Indians and all Maine residents. Racial misclassification occurred during a period when budget cuts had prompted procedural changes. This article has been cited by other articles:
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