Explanatory notes

The GRIM books span different years for different causes of death, depending on the data available. GRIM books for some causes of death start at 1907 and they are the only national electronic tabulations of deaths data by cause registered before 1964. Mortality data from 1964 onwards are sourced from the AIHW National Mortality Database and include data up to 2021.

Mortality data

  1. Cause of Death Unit Record File data are provided to the AIHW by the Registries of Births, Deaths and Marriages and the National Coronial Information System (managed by the Victorian Department of Justice) and include cause of death coded by the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS). The data are maintained by the AIHW in the National Mortality Database.
  2. Causes of death are coded by the ABS to the International Statistical Classification of Diseases and Related Health Problems (ICD).
  3. Deaths are counted according to year of registration of death, not necessarily the year in which the death occurred.
  4. Deaths registered in 2018 and earlier are based on the final version of cause of death data; deaths registered in 2019 are based on the revised version; deaths registered in 2020 and 2021 are based on preliminary versions. Revised and preliminary versions are subject to further revision by the ABS.
  5. Data by causes of death have been adjusted for Victorian additional death registrations in 2019. A time series adjustment has been applied to causes of death to enable a more accurate comparison of mortality over time. When the time series adjustment is applied, deaths are presented in the year in which they were registered (that is, removed from 2019 and added to 2017 or 2018). For more detail please refer to Technical note: Victorian additional registrations and time series adjustments in Causes of death, Australia methodology, 2019.
  6. Data for the registration years 2013–2020 have been updated to include data quality and completeness activities conducted by the ABS. These include:
    • additional Victorian death registrations in 2013–2016 that had not previously been included in the National Mortality Database
    • revisions to associated causes of death in Western Australia (2016–2020)
    • updates to deaths due to Other ill-defined and unspecified causes of mortality (R99) in the 2017 reference year.
    As a result, data may not equal previously published data for these years. For more detail please refer to Causes of death, Australia methodology, 2021
  7. For more information on the AIHW National Mortality Database see Deaths data at AIHW.
  8. The data quality statements underpinning the AIHW National Mortality Database can be found in the following ABS publications:

Population data

Australian estimated resident populations are sourced from the ABS reports National, state and territory population, Australian demographic statistics (ABS cat. no. 3101.0) and Australian historical population statistics (ABS cat. no. 3104.0.65.001).

Previous page