st: convert string variable to date

[Neophytos Stylianou <neophytos.stylianou@postgrad.manchester.ac.uk>]

Hello,

I have a problem with 2 of my variables which I want to convert form string to dates. One of the variable is "admissiondate" seen below:

				ADMISSIONDATE
type:	string (str13)

unique values:	3287	missing	"":	0/59047

examples:	"16th Aug 2007"
	"21st Feb 2007"
	"27th Jan 2011"
	"4th Apr 2007"

warning:	variable has embedded	blanks


My other variable is "dichordeathdate":

					DISCHORDEATHDATE
type:	string (str25)

unique values:	3335	missing	"":	0/59047

examples:	"16th Apr 2011"
	"21st Aug 2011"
	"27th Feb 2004"
	"3rd Sep 2009"

warning:	variable has embedded	blanks

How can I convert them to dates?

I do not think the command """gen admdate2 = date(admissiondate, "DMY")""" works here since I do have the 4digit year but I have the rd,st,th after the day!

Is there an easy way to covert the variable to date variable without having to rewrite the whole dates?

I am working on STATA 12

Thanks,
Neo Stylianou

PhD Candidate
University of Manchester



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