There are four measures for life expectancy, these are;
- Healthy life expectancy
- Life expectancy at birth
- Life expectancy at 65
- Gap in life expectancy at birth
Healthy life expectancy at birth is the average number of years a newborn baby would expect to live in good health if they experienced the age-specific mortality rates and prevalence of good health for a particular area and time period throughout their life based on contemporary mortality rates and prevalence of self-reported good health.
Life expectancy at birth is the average number of years a newborn baby would survive if they experienced the age-specific mortality rates for a particular area and time period throughout their life. Figures reflect mortality among those living in an area in a time period, rather than what will be experienced throughout life among those born in the area could expect to live, because the mortality rates of the area are likely to change in the future and many of those born in the area will live elsewhere for at least some part of their lives.
Life expectancy at 65 is an estimate of the average number of years at age 65 a person would survive if he or she experienced the age-specific mortality rates for a particular area and time period throughout his or her life after that age. Figures reflect mortality among those living in an area in each time period, rather than what will be experienced throughout life among those born in the area because the mortality rates of the area are likely to change in the future and because many of those born in the area will live elsewhere for at least some part of their lives.
Gap in life expectancy at birth between the local authority and England as a whole measures inequalities in life expectancy between each English local authority area and that of England as a whole and shows the gap in years between overall life expectancy at birth in each local authority and life expectancy at birth for England as a whole for a given time period. A negative figure means that the life expectancy of the area is lower than England, and a positive figure shows that the area has a higher life expectancy than England.