Social inequality and injuries: Do morbidity patterns differ from mortality?

Using the 1988 and 1989 National Health Interview Surveys, we explore the hypothesis that injury-related morbidity in general follows the same patterns of association with social/economic circumstances as has been found for injury-related mortality. We find the relationship to sociodemographic factors is similar to injury mortality. Also, being married appears to offer some protection against the risk of injury morbidity. Socioeconomic factors indicate that, controlling for poverty, whites of all ages are more likely to report a nonfatal injury. Finally, the net effects of other living circumstances and level of education have no significant effect on the risk of nonfatal injury. We discuss several explanations: problems of defining reportable morbidity; differential access to medical care; and the need to understand injury cause and severity to better explore the structural correlates of injury morbidity.