Use of different subjective health indicators to assess health inequalities in an urban immigrant population in north-western Italy: a cross-sectional study

BMC Public Health

Roberto Gasparini¹  Edoardo Berti Riboli²  Sergio Adamoli²  Valentina Perelli¹  Alessio Signori¹  Donatella Panatto¹  Daniela Amicizia¹  Alexander Domnich¹ 

[1] Department of Health Sciences, University of Genoa, via Pastore, 1-16132, Genoa, Italy;Non-Profit Organization “Medici in Africa”, largo Rosanna Benzi, 8-16132 Genoa, Italy

关键词: Health inequalities;    Self-rated health (SRH);    Health-related quality of life (HRQoL);    Subjective health indicators;    Immigrants;    Italy;   

Others  :  1161616
DOI  :  10.1186/1471-2458-13-1006

 received in 2013-06-28, accepted in 2013-10-21,  发布年份 2013

【 摘 要 】

Background

Despite the steady growth of the immigrant population in Italy, data on the health status of immigrants are scarce. Our main goals were to measure Health-Related Quality of Life (HRQoL), Self-Rated Health (SRH) and morbidity among immigrants in Genoa. We aimed to assess the relative contribution of some social, structural and behavioral determinants to “within-group” health disparities.

Methods

We enrolled 502 subjects by means of snowball sampling. The SF-12 questionnaire, integrated with socio-demographic and health-related items, was used. Multivariate logistic and Poisson regression models were applied in order to identify characteristics associated with poor SRH, lower SF-12 scores and prevalence of self-reported morbidities.

Results

Subjects showed relatively moderate levels of HRQoL (median physical and mental scores of 51.6 and 47.3, respectively) and about 15% of them rated their health as fair or poor. Lower scores in the physical dimension of HRQoL were associated with the presence of morbidities and immigration for work and religious reasons, while those who had migrated for religious and family reasons displayed a lower probability of lower scores in the mental dimension of HRQoL. Poor SRH was associated with female gender, overweight/obesity and presence of morbidities. Moreover, compared with immigrants from countries with a low human development index, immigrants from highly developed societies showed significantly lower odds of reporting poor SRH. About one-third of respondents reported at least one medical condition, while the prevalence of multi-morbidity was 10%. Females, over 45-year-olds, overweight and long-term immigrants had a higher prevalence of medical conditions.

Conclusions

Our study confirms the presence of health inequalities within a heterogeneous immigrant population. HRQoL, SRH and morbidity are valid, relatively rapid and cheap tools for measuring health inequalities, though they do so in different ways. These indicators should be used with caution and, if possible, simultaneously, as they could help to identify and to monitor more vulnerable subjects among immigrants.

【 授权许可】

   
2013 Domnich et al.; licensee BioMed Central Ltd.

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