Toward deeper research and better policy for healthy aging – using the unique data of Chinese longitudinal healthy longevity survey

The objectives of this review article are to facilitate deeper research and better policy analysis for healthy aging, which not only means surviving to old ages in good health, but also mean the economics and society of our country would be aging healthily, with sound policy and intervention programs. Toward these objectives, we introduce the Chinese Longitudinal Healthy Longevity Survey (CLHLS), which has been conducted by Center for Healthy Aging and Development Studies, National School of Development of Peking University since 1998. We present a comprehensive and summarized introduction of the CLHLS study design, sample distributions, contents, general quality assessment and availability of the CLHLS data collected. Such an introduction would be helpful for our colleagues who may be interested in using this unique and more-than-fourteen-year longitudinal survey data resource for deeper interdisciplinary research and better policy analysis on healthy aging. To illustrate how the unique data resources of CLHLS may be useful, we also summarize and discuss ten selected healthy aging policy related research based on data from the CLHLS. Finally, we discussed the future perspectives using the unique and rich CLHLS datasets.