Status, not location, important to health. (Health).OTTAWA Ottawa, city, Canada Ottawa (ŏt`əwə), city (1991 pop. 313,987), capital of Canada, SE Ont., at the confluence of the Ottawa and Rideau rivers. Hull, Que. -- One's economic and social status and state of mind are more important influences on health than where a person lives, according to according to prep. 1. As stated or indicated by; on the authority of: according to historians. 2. In keeping with: according to instructions. 3. the report Regional Socio-economic socio-economic adj → socioeconómico socio-economic adj → socioéconomique Context and Health, published by Statistics Canada. The report found that: * the region in which an individual lives has some influence on health, but only a modest one * individual factors, such as education and income and health-related risk factors, such as obesity obesity, condition resulting from excessive storage of fat in the body. Obesity has been defined as a weight more than 20% above what is considered normal according to standard age, height, and weight tables, or by a complex formula known as the body mass index. , play a larger role, accounting for much of the variation from one health region to another. The study examined the characteristics of people who reported their health as poor or fair in the Canadian Canadian (kənā`dēən), river, 906 mi (1,458 km) long, rising in NE New Mexico. and flowing E across N Texas and central Oklahoma into the Arkansas River in E Oklahoma. Community Health Survey of 2000/01. The report also found that self-described health status differed substantially between health regions and that regional socioeconomic so·ci·o·ec·o·nom·ic adj. Of or involving both social and economic factors. socioeconomic Adjective of or involving economic and social factors Adj. 1. factors were clearly associated with average health status in each region. People living in large metropolitan areas and urban centres, where education levels are high, had the highest life expectancies Life Expectancy 1. The age until which a person is expected to live. 2. The remaining number of years an individual is expected to live, based on IRS issued life expectancy tables. in all of Canada. However, people living in remote northern communities, where education levels are lower, had poorer health. In general, individuals' reports of fair or poor health status in the Canadian Community Health Survey were strongly associated with age, sex, education, household income and health risk factors. There were notable increases in the reporting of fair or poor health among individuals over the age of 45. For example, Canadians aged 45 to 64 were twice as likely, and those aged 65 or older nearly four times as likely, to report fair or poor health as those in the age group 30 to 44. Women reported fair or poor health more often than men. However, once other factors such as age were taken into account, women were slightly less likely than men to report fair or poor health. Education and household income were also significant. Lower education levels and household income were both associated with greater odds of reporting fair or poor health. The odds of individuals in the lowest income category of reporting fair or poor health were five times greater than those of individuals in the top income category, after taking into account other factors such as age, sex, smoking, obesity and physical activity. Reports of fair or poor health were greater among daily smokers, obese o·bese adj. Extremely fat; very overweight. obese characterized by obesity. obese adjective Characterized by obesity, see there; excessively fat individuals and people who exercised infrequently in·fre·quent adj. 1. Not occurring regularly; occasional or rare: an infrequent guest. 2. . Daily smokers were 1.5 times as likely as non-smokers to report fair or poor health. Individuals classified as obese were 1.7 times as likely to report fair or poor health as non-obese individuals. After the effects of population composition, income, education, and individual health risk factors were taken into account, socio-economic context was generally not significant. Which region people live in can have a modest association with self-reported health status, over and above individual factors. But the contextual factors examined--whether the region was remote, prosperous, cosmopolitan cos·mo·pol·i·tan adj. Growing or occurring in many parts of the world; widely distributed. n. A cosmopolitan organism. or disadvantaged--generally made no difference. Overall, these findings suggest that individual factors accounted for much of the variation among health regions in reporting fair or poor health. The influence of specific socio-economic environment factors on individuals reporting fair or poor health at the health region scale was small by comparison. There are several possible explanations for this relatively small contribution of health regions' social context on individual health status differences. A number of federal and provincial government programs such as universal health care, unemployment insurance and old age security, are designed to address social disparities, and they may well attenuate To reduce the force or severity; to lessen a relationship or connection between two objects. In Criminal Procedure, the relationship between an illegal search and a confession may be sufficiently attenuated as to remove the confession from the protection afforded by the the effects of the regional social context. Differences between health regions may also be the result of regional variables other than socio-economic context as it was measured by this study of health status across geographic localities. The variations between regions in the availability of the health care services was dwarfed by these other factors in accounting for individual health status differences. 613-951-4765 |
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