Can financial insecurity and condescending treatment explain the higher prevalence of poor self-rated health in women than in men? A population-based cross-sectional study in Sweden

International Journal for Equity in Health

Sirkka Elo⁴  Helena Pettersson²  Marina Kalander Blomqvist¹  Inna Feldman²  Fredrik Granström³  Anu Molarius⁵ 

[1] Department of Community Medicine, Värmland County Council, Karlstad, Sweden;Department of Community Medicine, Uppsala County Council, Uppsala, Sweden;Research & Development Centre,, Sörmland County Council, Eskilstuna, Sweden;Department of Community Medicine and Public Health, Örebro County Council, Örebro, Sweden;Västmanland County Council, Competence Centre for Health, 721 89 Västerås and Karlstad University, Karlstad, Sweden

关键词: Sweden;    Population surveys;    Self-rated health;    Health inequalities;    Gender;   

Others  :  826257
DOI  :  10.1186/1475-9276-11-50

 received in 2012-08-30, accepted in 2012-08-30,  发布年份 2012

【 摘 要 】

Introduction

Women have in general poorer self-rated health than men. Both material and psychosocial conditions have been found to be associated with self-rated health. We investigated whether two such factors, financial insecurity and condescending treatment, could explain the difference in self-rated health between women and men.

Methods

The association between the two factors and self-rated health was investigated in a population-based sample of 35,018 respondents. The data were obtained using a postal survey questionnaire sent to a random sample of men and women aged 18-75 years in 2008. The area covers 55 municipalities in central Sweden and the overall response rate was 59%. Multinomial odds ratios for poor self-rated health were calculated adjusting for age, educational level and longstanding illness and in the final model also for financial insecurity and condescending treatment.

Results

The prevalence of poor self-rated health was 7.4% among women and 6.0% among men. Women reported more often financial insecurity and condescending treatment than men did. The odds ratio for poor self-rated health in relation to good self-rated health was 1.29 (95% CI: 1.17-1.42) for women compared to men when adjusted for age, educational level and longstanding illness. The association became, however, statistically non-significant when adjusted for financial insecurity and condescending treatment.

Conclusion

The present findings suggest that women would have as good self-rated health as men if they had similar financial security as men and were not treated in a condescending manner to a larger extent than men. Longitudinal studies are, however, required to confirm this conclusion.

【 授权许可】

   
2012 Molarius et al.; licensee BioMed Central Ltd.

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