Drug

Refers to prescription drug or pharmaceutical agents, prescribed by a physician or other authorized medical professional, for the prevention or treatment of medical conditions or disease.

National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES)

Drug information from NHANES III and from NHANES 1999–2000 and later (referred to as continuous NHANES) was collected during in-person interviews conducted in participants’ homes. Starting with 2001–2002 data, participants were first asked whether they had taken medication (not including prescription dietary supplements) in the past 30 days for which they needed a prescription. For NHANES III and for NHANES 1999–2000, the question wording differed slightly: participants were asked whether they had taken a prescription medication in the past month. For participants younger than age 16, a parent or other proxy provided the information. For all survey years, those who answered “yes” were asked to provide the prescription medication containers for the interviewer. For each medication reported, the interviewer entered the product’s complete name from the container. If no container was available, the interviewer asked the participant to verbally report the name of the medication. In addition, participants were asked how long they had been taking the medication and the main reason for use. The respondents who reported taking prescription medicines in the past month but did not answer some or all of the remaining questions about the prescription medicines, such as the name of the medication or the duration they took the medicine, are coded as either “blank but applicable” or “don’t know” and were excluded from the analysis.

Drug data from NHANES provide a snapshot of all prescribed drugs reported by a sample of the U.S. civilian noninstitutionalized population for a 30-day period (or past month, for earlier survey years). In addition to capturing information on drugs taken daily, drugs taken on an irregular basis, such as every other day, once per week, or for a 10-day period, were captured in the 30-day recall period.

For more information on prescription drug data collection and coding in NHANES, see: National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey 2017-2018 Data Documentation, Codebook, and Frequencies, and National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey 1988-2020 Data Documentation, Codebook, and Frequencies.

For more information on NHANES III prescription drug data collection and coding, see: Third National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey 1998-1994 Documentation, Codebook, and Frequencies: Prescription Medications. Also see Sources and Definitions, National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES).