health differences
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Author(s):  
Amaya Erro-Garcés ◽  
Maria Elena Aramendia-Muneta ◽  
María Errea ◽  
Juan M. Cabases-Hita

This paper aims to analyse the relationship between perceived health and earnings across Europe. Empirical analysis is based on the last published round from the European Working Conditions Survey (N = 43,850) and offers updated evidence on the effect of earnings on perceived health in 35 countries. The main findings show a positive and significant relationship between earnings and health, which is consistent with the existing literature. Moreover, health seems to be U-shaped relative to earnings. On the other hand, age is negatively related to health, which is consistent with previous research. This paper shows the health differences between countries, where cultural, geographic, and economic differences imply health inequalities across countries. From a practical perspective, understanding the dynamics of perceived health and earnings’ processes can contribute to health policy.


2022 ◽  
Vol 8 ◽  
pp. 233372142110558
Author(s):  
Jungjoo Lee ◽  
Junhyung Kim ◽  
Richard Holden

Most studies have classified older adults with diabetes into one group despite substantial variation in health status across different stages of late adulthood. In this study, we examined difference in self-reported physical and mental health among three age groups of older adults with diabetes. Using data from the 2016 National Social Life, Health and Aging Project, Wave 3, we classified 424 individuals diagnosed with diabetes into three age groups, young-old (YO): 50–64 years; middle-old (MO): 65–74; and oldest old (OO): 75+ years. A one-way multivariate analysis of covariance was used to assess group differences, followed by univariate analyses. The results indicate that the YO group reported significantly lower physical health and higher depression than the MO group and higher levels of loneliness than the MO and OO groups. These findings indicate that physical and mental health may differ among different age groups of older adults with diabetes and suggest that the YO might be more vulnerable to diminished physical and mental health than the other age groups.


2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ilse Dijkstra

Inspired and informed by contemporary research within Science and Technology Studies (STS), this essay discusses how social epidemiological research serves to create and produce health inequalities in society. Focusing in particular on how social epidemiology establishes the relationship between socio-economic status and health, it examines how the accumulation of different studies relying on different indicators and measures results in the construction of new facts and generalizations concerning the health of people with a lower socio-economic status. By identifying groups “known to be unhealthy”, the essay presents social epidemiology as participating in the co-production of the social and political infrastructures underlying policy decisions. To increase awareness within social epidemiology of the politics of its own knowledge practices, it concludes by recommending new interdisciplinary collaborations.


2021 ◽  
Vol ahead-of-print (ahead-of-print) ◽  
Author(s):  
Antti Kähäri

PurposePrevious research has shown that in contemporary societies, women have a healthier dietary intake than men. However, no research has examined how this gender gap develops over the long term. The present study examined how gender differences in fresh vegetable intake frequency have evolved from 1979 to 2017 in Finland and whether differences are affected by age or educational level.Design/methodology/approachThe data were derived from annually repeated, nationally representative “Health Behaviour and Health among the Finnish Adult Population” and “Regional Health and Well-being (RHW)” surveys on the health habits of the Finnish population. The dataset is a time series of repeated cross-sectional surveys. In total, the data sample comprised 161,996 Finns aged 20–64 years. Descriptive methods and logistic regression were used for the analysis.FindingsDuring 1979–2017, the prevalence of daily vegetable intake increased from 12 to 35% among men and from 18 to 56% among women. Thus, the magnitude of the gap between genders doubled across the study period. The increased vegetable intake was partly explained by the changing education and age structures of society. Potential explanations and avenues for future research are also discussed. Policy implications depend on whether the findings are interpreted as a case of health differences or health inequality.Originality/valueThis study used a long time series to analyse how gender differences in vegetable intake have evolved in a Nordic welfare state context. It showed that the gap in fresh vegetable intake between men and women has widened.


2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Helene Colineaux ◽  
Alexandra Soulier ◽  
Benoit Lepage ◽  
Michelle Kelly-Irving

Abstract BackgroundEpidemiologists need tools to measure effects of gender, a complex concept originating in the humanities and social sciences which is not easily operationalized in the discipline. MethodsWe conducted a conceptual analysis and applied causal and mediation analysis methodology to standard questions in order to propose a methodologically appropriate strategy for measuring sex and gender effects in health.ResultsWe define gender as a set of norms prescribed to individuals according to their attributed-at-birth sex. Gender pressure creates a systemic gap, at population level, in behaviors, activities, experiences, etc. between men and women. A pragmatic individual measure of gender would correspond to the level at which an individual complies with a set of elements constituting femininity or masculinity in a given population, place and time. However, defining and measuring gender is not sufficient to isolate the effects of sex and gender on a health outcome. We should also think in terms of pathways to define appropriate analysis strategies. Gender could also be examined as a mechanism rather than through its realization in the individual, by considering it as an interaction between sex and environment. ConclusionsBoth analytical strategies have limitations relative to the impossibility of reducing a complex concept to a single or a few measures, and of capturing the entire effect of the phenomenon. However, these strategies could lead to more accurate and rigorous analyses of the mechanisms underlying health differences between men and women, and ultimately limit the sex and/or gender bias encountered in epidemiological and clinical research studies.


Author(s):  
Minke R. C. van Minde ◽  
Marlou L. A. de Kroon ◽  
Meertien K. Sijpkens ◽  
Hein Raat ◽  
Eric A. P. Steegers ◽  
...  

Background: Living in deprivation is related to ill health. Differences in health outcomes between neighbourhoods may be attributed to neighbourhood socio-economic status (SES). Additional to differences in health, neighbourhood differences in child wellbeing could also be attributed to neighbourhood SES. Therefore, we aimed to investigate the association between neighbourhood deprivation, and social indicators of child wellbeing. Methods: Aggregated data from 3565 neighbourhoods in 390 municipalities in the Netherlands were eligible for analysis. Neighbourhood SES scores and neighbourhood data on social indicators of child wellbeing were used to perform repeated measurements, with one year measurement intervals, over a period of 11 years. Linear mixed models were used to estimate the associations between SES score and the proportion of unfavorable social indicators of child wellbeing. Results: After adjustment for year, population size, and clustering within neighbourhoods and within a municipality, neighbourhood SES was inversely associated with the proportion of ‘children living in families on welfare’ (estimates with two cubic splines: −3.59 [CI: −3.99; −3.19], and −3.00 [CI: −3.33; −2.67]), ‘delinquent youth’ (estimate −0.26 [CI: −0.30; −0.23]) and ‘unemployed youth’ (estimates with four cubic splines: −0.41 [CI: −0.57; −0.25], −0.58 [CI: −0.73; −0.43], −1.35 [−1.70; −1.01], and −0.96 [1.24; −0.70]). Conclusions: In this study using repeated measurements, a lower neighbourhood SES was significantly associated with a higher prevalence of unfavorable social indicators of child wellbeing. This contributes to the body of evidence that neighbourhood SES is strongly related to child health and a child’s ability to reach its full potential in later life. Future studies should consist of larger longitudinal datasets, potentially across countries, and should attempt to take the interpersonal variation into account with more individual-level data on SES and outcomes.


2021 ◽  
Vol 5 (Supplement_1) ◽  
pp. 522-522
Author(s):  
Sindhu Vasireddy ◽  
Jenjira Yahirun ◽  
Mark Hayward

Abstract Education is a strong predictor of cognitive health among older adults, and recent research indicates that apart from one’s own education, the educational resources of family members also play a crucial role in shaping cognitive health over the life course. We add to this literature by investigating whether the advantages of highly educated family members matter for both Blacks and Whites in the U.S. Specifically, we ask whether the resources of family members-parents and offspring-partially explain the racial gap in both the prevalence and incidence of cognitive health across both groups. For this, we employ logistic regression models to examine the prevalence of cognitive impairment at baseline, and discrete-time event history models to assess the incidence of cognitive impairment, using data from the Health and Retirement Study (HRS) for the years ranging from 2000 to 2012. Preliminary results indicate that at the baseline, respondent’s own education is predictive of cognitive impairment among Whites, but not Blacks. Once respondent-level health conditions and behaviors are taken into consideration, parental or offspring education is not associated with the prevalence of cognitive impairment. For respondents who are not impaired at the baseline, our results from the incidence models align with the “adjacent generations” literature suggesting that both parental and offspring education has a salient positive effect on later-life cognitive health. However, we find notable differences across groups to suggest that the education of parents and offspring may play a larger role in mitigating cognitive decline among African Americans, compared to Whites.


2021 ◽  
Vol 79 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Masayoshi Oka

Abstract Background Standardization and normalization of continuous covariates are used to ease the interpretation of regression coefficients. Although these scaling techniques serve different purposes, they are sometimes used interchangeably or confused for one another. Therefore, the objective of this study is to demonstrate how these scaling techniques lead to different interpretations of the regression coefficient in multilevel logistic regression analyses. Methods Area-based socioeconomic data at the census tract level were obtained from the 2015–2019 American Community Survey for creating two measures of neighborhood socioeconomic status (SES), and a hypothetical data on health condition (favorable versus unfavorable) was constructed to represent 3000 individuals living across 300 census tracts (i.e., neighborhoods). Two measures of neighborhood SES were standardized by subtracting its mean and dividing by its standard deviation (SD) or by dividing by its interquartile range (IQR), and were normalized into a range between 0 and 1. Then, four separate multilevel logistic regression analyses were conducted to assess the association between neighborhood SES and health condition. Results Based on standardized measures, the odds of having unfavorable health condition was roughly 1.34 times higher for a one-SD change or a one-IQR change in neighborhood SES; these reflect a health difference of individuals living in relatively high SES (relatively affluent) neighborhoods and those living in relatively low SES (relatively deprived) neighborhoods. On the other hand, when these standardized measures were replaced by its respective normalized measures, the odds of having unfavorable health condition was roughly 3.48 times higher for a full unit change in neighborhood SES; these reflect a health difference of individuals living in highest SES (most affluent) neighborhoods and those living in lowest SES (most deprived) neighborhoods. Conclusion Multilevel logistic regression analyses using standardized and normalized measures of neighborhood SES lead to different interpretations of the effect of neighborhood SES on health. Since both measures are valuable in their own right, interpreting a standardized and normalized measure of neighborhood SES will allow us to gain a more rounded view of the health differences of individuals along the gradient of neighborhood SES in a certain geographic location as well as across different geographic locations.


2021 ◽  
Vol 5 (Supplement_1) ◽  
pp. 876-876
Author(s):  
Christi Nelson ◽  
Ross Andel

Abstract Lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) health disparities have been well documented in previous research. This study examined whether the level of equality in state of residence (high, medium, fair, poor, or negative), determined by tallied LGBT-related laws and policies, was associated with health outcomes for LGBT adults. This study consisted of 3486 LGB and 959 transgender adults ages 50+ as well as 1:1 propensity matched heterosexual and cisgender participants from the 2018 and 2019 Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System (BRFSS) surveys. Separate logistic regression analyses for the LGB, transgender, heterosexual, and cisgender groups were conducted to assess health differences by state equality ranking. Results indicated that LGB participants in fair ranked states were more likely to report fair/poor general health (aOR=1.4, 95% CI=1.1-1.8) and 14 or more days of poor mental health in the past 30 days (aOR=1.4, 95% CI=1.1-1.9) compared to LGB in high ranked states. LGB participants in a low or negative ranked state were more likely to report fair/poor health (aOR=1.6, 95% CI=1.3-2.0), 14 days or more of poor physical health (aOR=1.5, 95% CI=1.1-1.8), and 14 or more days of poor mental health (aOR=1.3, 95% CI=1.0-1.7) in the past 30 days. Transgender participants in medium and low/negative ranked states were more likely to report fair/poor health (lowest aOR=1.75, 95% CI=1.3-2.5) compared to transgender individuals in high equality states. Similar results were not found for the matched heterosexual and cisgender groups. These results suggest that LGBT-related laws and policies may play a role in LGBT health.


Author(s):  
Nico Vonneilich ◽  
Daniel Bremer ◽  
Olaf von dem Knesebeck ◽  
Daniel Lüdecke

Introduction: European populations are becoming older and more diverse. Little is known about the health differences between the migrant and non-migrant elderly in Europe. The aim of this paper was to analyse changes in the health patterns of middle- and older-aged migrant and non-migrant populations in Europe from 2004 to 2017, with a specific focus on differences in age and gender. We analysed changes in the health patterns of older migrants and non-migrants in European countries from 2004 to 2017. Method: Based on data from the Survey of Health, Ageing and Retirement in Europe (6 waves; 2004–2017; n = 233,117) we analysed three health indicators (physical functioning, depressive symptoms, and self-rated health). Logistic regression models for complex samples were calculated. Interaction terms (wave * migrant * gender * age) were used to analyse gender and age differences and the change over time. Results: Middle- and older-aged migrants in Europe showed significantly higher rates of depressive symptoms, lower self-rated health, and a higher proportion of limitations on general activities compared to non-migrants. However, different time trends were observed. An increasing health gap was identified in the physical functioning of older males. Narrowing health gaps over time were observed in women. Discussion: An increasing health gap in physical functioning in men is evidence of cumulative disadvantage. In women, evidence points towards the hypothesis of aging-as-leveler. These different results highlight the need for specific interventions focused on healthy ageing in elderly migrant men.


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