Determinants of health disparities between Italian regions

BMC Public Health

Research Article

Margherita Giannoni¹  Luisa Franzini² 

[1] Dipartimento di Economia Finanza e Statistica Universita' degli Studi di Perugia, Via Pascoli 20, 06124, Perugia, Italy;MECOP Institute, University of Lugano, Via Giuseppe Buffi 6, CH-6904, Lugano, Switzerland;Management, Policy, and Community Health Division, University of Texas School of Public Health, 1200 Pressler Drive, 77030, Houston, TX, USA;

关键词: Poor Health;    Private Expenditure;    Italian Region;    Capital Intensity;    Material Deprivation;   

DOI  :  10.1186/1471-2458-10-296

 received in 2010-02-08, accepted in 2010-06-01,  发布年份 2010

来源: Springer

【 摘 要 】

BackgroundAmong European countries, Italy is one of the countries where regional health disparities contribute substantially to socioeconomic health disparities. In this paper, we report on regional differences in self-reported poor health and explore possible determinants at the individual and regional levels in Italy.MethodsWe use data from the "Indagine Multiscopo sulle Famiglie", a survey of aspects of everyday life in the Italian population, to estimate multilevel logistic regressions that model poor self-reported health as a function of individual and regional socioeconomic factors. Next we use the causal step approach to test if living conditions, healthcare characteristics, social isolation, and health behaviors at the regional level mediate the relationship between regional socioeconomic factors and self-rated health.ResultsWe find that residents living in regions with more poverty, more unemployment, and more income inequality are more likely to report poor health and that poor living conditions and private share of healthcare expenditures at the regional level mediate socioeconomic disparities in self-rated health among Italian regions.ConclusionThe implications are that regional contexts matter and that regional policies in Italy have the potential to reduce health disparities by implementing interventions aimed at improving living conditions and access to quality healthcare.

【 授权许可】

CC BY   
© Franzini and Giannoni; licensee BioMed Central Ltd. 2010