Table 1

Respondent characteristics of older people: 2001–2009

	2001–2003 (%) N=1284	2005–2006 (%) N=1303	2008–2009 (%) N=1245
Age:
≥85	12	11	11
75–84	34	32	33
64–74	54	57	56
Gender:
Male	45	45	45
Female	55	55	55
Marital status:
Married, registered partner	58	62	60
Widowed	33	28	28
Divorced	5	6	8
Never married	5	4	4
Education:^* ^†
Primary education or less	35	30	26
Secondary education	51	54	56
Tertiary education	13	16	18
Religion:^†
None	38	41	41
Dutch reformed/protestant	28	26	27
Catholic	29	28	27
Other	5	5	4
Number of seven assessed major chronic diseases:^‡
None	23	22	20
1	39	37	36
2	26	26	27
>2	13	15	16
Depression:
Not depressed (CES-D <16)	85	85	88
Depressed (CES-D ≥16)	15	15	12
Cognitive impairment:
No cognitive impairment (MMSE ≥24)	88	88	90
Cognitive impairment (MMSE <24)	12	12	10
Cohort:
Old	100	74	60
New	–	26	40

↵* Primary education includes: elementary not completed and elementary education. Secondary education includes: lower vocational education, general intermediate vocational education and general secondary education. Tertiary education includes: higher vocational education, college education and university education.
↵† Religion and education were measured once in 2001–2003 for the old and new cohort.
↵‡ The seven most frequently occurring chronic diseases include: chronic non-specific lung disease, cardiac disease, peripheral arterial disease, diabetes mellitus, cerebrovascular accident or stroke, osteoarthritis or rheumatoid arthritis and cancer.
CES-D, Center for Epidemiologic Studies Depression Scale; MMSE, Mini–Mental State Examination.