RESEARCH ARTICLE
Exploring Mortality Rates for Major Causes of Death in Korea
Hyo Jung Oh1, Donng Min Yang1, Chong Hyuck Kim1, Jae Gyu Jeon2, Nam Hyung Jung2, Chan Young Kim3, Jürgen Symanzik4, Hyo Won Oh5, Akugizibwe Edwin6, Seong Il, Jo6, Jeong Yong Ahn6, *
Article Information
Identifiers and Pagination:
Year: 2019Volume: 12
First Page: 16
Last Page: 25
Publisher ID: TOPHJ-12-16
DOI: 10.2174/1874944501912010016
Article History:
Received Date: 16/10/2018Revision Received Date: 22/1/2019
Acceptance Date: 23/1/2019
Electronic publication date: 28/1/2019
Collection year: 2019
open-access license: This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International Public License (CC-BY 4.0), a copy of which is available at: (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/legalcode). This license permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.
Abstract
Background:
The trends and patterns of the mortality rates for causes of death are meaningful information. They can provide a basis for national demographic and health care policies by identifying the number, causes, and geographical distribution of deaths.
Objective:
To explore and analyze the characteristics of the mortality rates for major causes of death in Korea.
Methods:
Some common data analysis methods were used to describe the data. We also used some visualization techniques such as heat maps and line plots to present mortality rates by gender, age, and year.
Results:
Our analysis shows the crude mortality rates have continually decreased over the last 25 years from 1983, though they have increased slightly since 2006. In addition, the top eight causes of death accounted for 80% of all Korean deaths in 2015. During the period 2005-2015, the leading cause of death was cancer in male and circulatory diseases in female. The trend for respiratory diseases shows a steep upward trend in males, while a similar trend can be observed for respiratory and nervous system diseases in females.
Conclusion:
The deaths for circulatory, respiratory, nervous system, digestive, and infectious diseases are the highest in the age 80 to 84, while cancer is the leading cause of death for ages 75 to 79. In addition, the mortality rates for circulatory, nervous, and respiratory diseases increase rapidly after the age of 80. Therefore, policies on health and welfare for the elderly are getting more and more important.
