Assigning lifetime occupation domains for older Mexicans: MHAS-O*NET linkage protocol

Objective. We developed a MHAS (Mexican Health and Aging Study) and O*NET (Occupational Information Network) linkage to allow global researchers using MHAS data to assign lifetime occupation domains for older Mexicans. Materials and methods. Three bilingual raters independently matched 440 records with 132 unique occupation codes from the 2012 MHAS. We used a modified Delphi technique to reach agreements. To assess reliability, we compared the distribution of observations between the MHAS file and the MHAS-O*NET linked file across five job categories (upper white collar, lower white collar, upper blue collar, low blue collar, and agriculture/fishing/forestry). The Institutional Review Board at the University of Texas Medical Branch reviewed and approved the research (IRB # 21-0268). Results. Using the developed 1:1 MHAS-O*NET linkage, consistency between MHAS and O*NET was 97.4% across the five job categories. Conclusion. This MHAS-O*NET linkage will allow researchers to analyze the association between lifetime occupation and multiple dimensions of health, functionality, and retirement determinants for a low-middle income country with a large proportion of workers in the informal sector.