New South Wales Population Health Survey
Description
The New South Wales Population Health Survey is conducted continuously between February and December each year and covers the whole state population from birth upwards. The target population is all state residents living in households with private telephones. The target sample is approximately 1,500 people in each area health service (a total sample of 12,000).
Households are contacted using list assisted random digit dialling. Up to seven calls are made to establish initial contact with a household and up to five calls are made to contact a selected respondent. One person from the household is randomly selected for inclusion in the survey. Carers or parents of children aged 0-15 years are interviewed on their behalf.
Respondents are asked questions from modules on demographics, health behaviours, health status, and access to and satisfaction with health services. Additional question modules are added periodically and are reported less frequently.
Trained telephone interviewers carry out the interviews. Most interviews are conducted in English but the survey is also conducted in five other languages: Arabic, Chinese, Greek, Italian and Vietnamese.
The sample is weighted to adjust for differences in the probabilities of selection among subjects, and for differences between the age and sex structure of the sample and Australian Bureau of Statistics mid-year population estimates for New South Wales. This enables calculation of prevalence estimates for the state population rather than for the respondents selected.