What to know
- The National Center for Health Statistics (NCHS) is proposing updates to the National Health Interview Survey (NHIS).
- NCHS is redesigning NHIS to modernize its data collection process.
- The redesign is in response to rising costs, growing difficulty in reaching households, and the need for a more flexible and efficient survey.
Overview
CDC's National Center for Health Statistics (NCHS) has proposed a redesign of the National Health Interview Survey (NHIS). Since 1957, NHIS has collected and analyzed health data to monitor the health of people across the country.
The proposed NHIS redesign includes—
- Revisions to the adult and child questionnaires
- Use of a sequential mixed-mode data collection design with self-response options
Changes to the questionnaires are intended to improve the measurement of contemporary health topics and reduce respondent burden through shorter and less complex instruments.
The redesign reflects the ongoing need to maintain a gold-standard national health survey while adapting to increasing data collection costs and respondent preferences by incorporating lower-cost, self-administered data collection modes.
Proposed content
Review the draft questionnaires and a brief description of the redesign (in the Federal Register) to learn more—
Public comment
NCHS invites public comment on all areas of the proposed redesign. Comments are especially welcome regarding—
- Structure, length, and clarity of the revised questionnaire
- Shift to a sequential mixed mode design
- Proposed addition or removal of content
- How these changes may affect data quality, usability, and trends over time
Commenters who suggest questionnaire additions are encouraged to identify the minimum question sets to meet identified data needs.
NCHS is also interested in comments on the practical utility of child-level data collection that is largely limited to domains for which all-person population estimates are desired (i.e., population estimates that have historically relied on data from both the adult and child-focused interviews).
Comment submission
Written comments must be received on or before October 20, 2026.
You may submit comments, identified by Docket No. CDC-2026-1387 by any of the following methods:
- Federal eRulemaking Portal:
- Go to the Federal Register Notice
- Click on the blue "Comment" button at the top to submit comments
- Mail: Jeffrey M. Zirger, Information Collection Review Office, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 1600 Clifton Road, N.E., MS-D74, Atlanta, Georgia 30329
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