Socioeconomic determinants of myalgic encephalomyelitis/chronic fatigue syndrome in Norway: a registry study.


Journal

BMC public health
ISSN: 1471-2458
Titre abrégé: BMC Public Health
Pays: England
ID NLM: 100968562

Informations de publication

Date de publication:
13 May 2024
Historique:
received: 30 03 2023
accepted: 02 05 2024
medline: 14 5 2024
pubmed: 14 5 2024
entrez: 13 5 2024
Statut: epublish

Résumé

Previous research has shown that socioeconomic status (SES) is a strong predictor of chronic disease. However, to the best of our knowledge, there has been no studies of how SES affects the risk of Myalgic encephalomyelitis/chronic fatigue syndrome (ME/CFS) that has not been based upon self-reporting or retrospectively screening of symptoms. As far as we know, this is therefore the first study that isolate and describe socioeconomic determinants of ME/CFS and calculate how these factors relate to the risk of ME/CFS diagnosis by utilizing individual level registry data. This allows for objective operationalization of the ME/CFS population, and makes it possible to model SES affect the risk of ME/CFS diagnosis, relative to control groups. We conduct a pooled cross-sectional analysis of registry data from all adult patients diagnosed with ME/CFS from 2016 to 2018 in Norway, coupled with socioeconomic data from statistics Norway from 2011 to 2018. We operationalize SES as household income and educational attainment fixed at the beginning of the study period. We compare the effects of SES on the risk of ME/CFS diagnosis to a population of chronically ill patients with hospital diagnoses that share clinical characteristics of ME/CFS and a healthy random sample of the Norwegian population. Our models are estimated by logistic regression analyses. When comparing the risk of ME/CFS diagnosis with a population consisting of people with four specific chronic diseases, we find that high educational attainment is associated with a 19% increase (OR: 1.19) in the risk of ME/CFS and that high household income is associated with a 17% decrease (OR:0.83) in risk of ME/CFS. In our second model we compare with a healthy population sample, and found that low educational attainment is associated with 69% decrease (OR:0.31) in the risk of ME/CFS and that low household income is associated with a 53% increase (OR: 1.53). We find statistically significant associations between SES and the risk of ME/CFS. However, our more detailed analyses shows that our findings vary according to which population we compare the ME/CFS patients with, and that the effect of SES is larger when comparing with a healthy population sample, as opposed to controls with selected hospital diagnoses.

Sections du résumé

BACKGROUND BACKGROUND
Previous research has shown that socioeconomic status (SES) is a strong predictor of chronic disease. However, to the best of our knowledge, there has been no studies of how SES affects the risk of Myalgic encephalomyelitis/chronic fatigue syndrome (ME/CFS) that has not been based upon self-reporting or retrospectively screening of symptoms. As far as we know, this is therefore the first study that isolate and describe socioeconomic determinants of ME/CFS and calculate how these factors relate to the risk of ME/CFS diagnosis by utilizing individual level registry data. This allows for objective operationalization of the ME/CFS population, and makes it possible to model SES affect the risk of ME/CFS diagnosis, relative to control groups.
DATA AND METHODS METHODS
We conduct a pooled cross-sectional analysis of registry data from all adult patients diagnosed with ME/CFS from 2016 to 2018 in Norway, coupled with socioeconomic data from statistics Norway from 2011 to 2018. We operationalize SES as household income and educational attainment fixed at the beginning of the study period. We compare the effects of SES on the risk of ME/CFS diagnosis to a population of chronically ill patients with hospital diagnoses that share clinical characteristics of ME/CFS and a healthy random sample of the Norwegian population. Our models are estimated by logistic regression analyses.
RESULTS RESULTS
When comparing the risk of ME/CFS diagnosis with a population consisting of people with four specific chronic diseases, we find that high educational attainment is associated with a 19% increase (OR: 1.19) in the risk of ME/CFS and that high household income is associated with a 17% decrease (OR:0.83) in risk of ME/CFS. In our second model we compare with a healthy population sample, and found that low educational attainment is associated with 69% decrease (OR:0.31) in the risk of ME/CFS and that low household income is associated with a 53% increase (OR: 1.53).
CONCLUSION CONCLUSIONS
We find statistically significant associations between SES and the risk of ME/CFS. However, our more detailed analyses shows that our findings vary according to which population we compare the ME/CFS patients with, and that the effect of SES is larger when comparing with a healthy population sample, as opposed to controls with selected hospital diagnoses.

Identifiants

pubmed: 38741074
doi: 10.1186/s12889-024-18757-7
pii: 10.1186/s12889-024-18757-7
doi:

Types de publication

Journal Article

Langues

eng

Sous-ensembles de citation

IM

Pagination

1296

Informations de copyright

© 2024. The Author(s).

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Auteurs

Geir Haakon Hilland (GH)

SINTEF Digital, Department of Health, Health services research group, Strindvegen 4, Trondheim, 7034, Norway.

Kjartan Sarheim Anthun (KS)

SINTEF Digital, Department of Health, Health services research group, Strindvegen 4, Trondheim, 7034, Norway. Kjartan.sarheim.anthun@sintef.no.
Department of Public Health and Nursing, Norwegian University of Science and Technology, Håkon Jarlsgate 11, Trondheim, 7030, Norway. Kjartan.sarheim.anthun@sintef.no.

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