Impact of weighting on the association between sociodemographic characteristics, health behaviours and cancer, cardiovascular and all-cause mortality in the Australian 45 and Up Study

Background Weighting can improve study estimate representativeness. We examined the impact of weighting on associations between participants’ characteristics and cancer, cardiovascular and all-cause mortality in the Australian 45 and Up Study cohort. Methods Raking weighted cohort data to the 2006 Australian population for seven sociodemographic characteristics. Deaths were ascertained via linkage to routinely collected data. Cox’s proportional hazards regression quantified associations between 11 sociodemographic and health characteristics and cancer, cardiovascular and all-cause mortality. The ratios of hazard ratios (RHRs) compared unweighted and weighted estimates. Results Among 195,052 included participants (median follow-up 11.4 years), there were 7200 cancer, 5912 cardiovascular and 21,840 all-cause deaths. Overall, 102/111 (91.9%) weighted HRs did not differ significantly from unweighted HRs (100%, 86.5% and 89.2% of 37 HRs for cancer, cardiovascular and all-cause mortality, respectively). Significant differences included a somewhat stronger association between single/widowed/divorced (versus married/de-facto) and cardiovascular mortality (unweighted HR=1.25 (95%CI:1.18–1.32), weighted HR=1.33 (95%CI:1.24–1.42), RHR=1.06 (95%CI:1.02–1.11)); and between no school certificate/qualification (versus university degree) and all-cause mortality (unweighted HR=1.21 (95%CI:1.15–1.27), weighted HR=1.28 (95%CI:1.19–1.38), RHR=1.06 (95%CI:1.03–1.10)). Conclusion Our results support the generalisability of most estimates of associations in the 45 and Up Study, particularly in relation to cancer mortality. Slight distortion of a few associations with cardiovascular or all-cause mortality were observed.