# Logistic or Poisson Regression for Mortality Modelling?

I am attempting to model the probability of death while controlling for a number of other variables. I began to do this with standard logistic regression, but I've come across a number of articles that use Poisson regression to model mortality rates. My independent variable is death (0/1). Is Poisson regression preferred to Logistic Regression when modelling something like death or vice versa? If so why?

• It depends on the data setup and research question. Since your interest is in the probability of death and your independent variable is 0/1, logistic regression is suitable here. The other articles might have been counting the incidents of death. Then their response variable would be count data. – Greenparker Mar 26 '16 at 12:20

Another point is that researchers sometimes use Poisson regression with an offset of log(population size) even when modelling "rate" or probability (and not total number). For outcomes with low probabilities, the results will be very similar (the link functions [logit and log], as well as the variance functions [$$np(1-p)$$ and $$\mu$$], are very similar when the probability is close to 0).