Expanding the Life Tables for Companion Dogs in UK and Japan to Include the Healthy Life Expectancy

We provide a method to expand the Life Tables for Dogs in UK and Japan, to include the Healthy Life Years Lost to Disability (HLYL), to estimate the Proportion with Disability and then apply the Sullivan Method to estimate the Disability Free Life Expectancy (DFLE) or the Healthy Life Expectancy (HLE) and the Healthy Life Years Lost (HLYL). The main part of the theory appears in: Skiadas, C. H., & Skiadas, C. (2020). Direct healthy life expectancy estimates from life tables with a Sullivan extension. Bridging the gap between HALE and Eurostat estimates. In The Springer series on demographic methods and population analysis 50. Springer. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-44695-6_3 . This study utilized data from life tables for the UK companion dog population and breed groups provided in a recent study by Teng, K.Ty., Brodbelt, D.C., Pegram, C. et al. in Scientific Reports 12, 6415 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-022-10341-6 . The data come from 30,563 dogs that died between 1st January 2016 and 31st July 2020 with an overall life expectancy of 11.23 years. According to the authors “Life tables generated by this study allowed a deeper understanding of the varied life trajectory across many types of dogs and offer novel insights and applications to improve canine health and welfare. The current study helps promote further understanding of life expectancy, which will benefit pet owners and the veterinary profession, along with many other sectors.” In another study by Inoue, M., Hasegawa, A., Hosoi, Y. & Sugiura, K. A current life table and causes of death for insured dogs in Japan. Prev. Vet. Med. 120, 210–218 (2015), the life expectancies in Japan were evaluated in 12,039 dogs which were buried or cremated during January 2012 to March 2015. The data of dogs were collected at the eight animal cemeteries in Tokyo. The overall life expectancy of dogs was 13.7 years. Both life table applications in the UK and Japan provide interesting information for the health state of dogs. However, more information is provided by estimating not only the life expectancy but also the healthy life expectancy and the healthy life years lost and the disability percentage, by expanding the provided life tables as we do in the present paper.