In most jurisdictions, information on socioeconomic attributes of geographic areas is readily available. As well, limited measures of health, such as mortality rates or indicators derived from health service use, are also routinely collected for geographically defined populations. In this paper we present a methodology for selecting and combining measures of area socioeconomic characteristics to produce a composite index which is relevant for health-related research. The performance of this composite index in this setting was consistent with deprivation indices developed in the United Kingdom, and showed strong associations with measures of population health status and health service utilization.