Exploring social inequalities in healthcare trajectories following diagnosis of diabetes: a state sequence analysis of linked survey and administrative data.

BACKGROUND: Social inequalities in complications associated with diabetes mellitus persist. As a primary care sensitive condition (PCSC), this association could be related to differential access to primary care. Our objectives are to establish a typology of care trajectories following a new diagnosis, and to explore social determinants of trajectories. METHODS: We used the TorSaDe (The Care Trajectories-Enriched Data) cohort, which links Canadian Community Health Survey respondents to health administrative data. Care trajectories were mapped over a two-year period following a new diagnosis and analysed using state sequence and clustering methods. Associations between individual and geographic characteristics with trajectory types were assessed with multinomial logistic regression. RESULTS: Three trajectories were identified: Regular Family Physician (FP) Predominant, Specialist Physician Predominant, and Few Services. With Regular FP as the reference, males had higher odds of experiencing the Few Services trajectory, higher education was associated with higher odds of both the Few Services and the Specialist trajectories, and immigrants had higher odds of the Specialist trajectory. Diagnoses in a physician's office, as opposed to in hospital, were associated with higher odds of the Regular FP trajectory. CONCLUSIONS: The Regular FP trajectory most closely aligns with the management principles of the PCSC approach. We did not find strong evidence of social status privileging access to this trajectory. However, the association with location of diagnosis suggests that efforts to ensure patients diagnosed in hospital are well linked to a regular family physician for follow up may help to reduce unnecessary specialist use and meet PCSC goals.

Association between Neighbourhood Deprivation Trajectories and Self-Perceived Health: Analysis of a Linked Survey and Health Administrative Data.

Life course exposure to neighbourhood deprivation may have a previously unstudied relationship with health disparities. This study examined the association between neighbourhood deprivation trajectories (NDTs) and poor reported self-perceived health (SPH) among Quebec's adult population. Data of 45,990 adults with complete residential address histories from the Care-Trajectories-Enriched Data cohort, which links Canadian Community Health Survey respondents to health administrative data, were used. Accordingly, participants were categorised into nine NDTs (T1 (Privileged Stable)-T9 (Deprived Stable)). Using multivariate logistic regression, the association between trajectory groups and poor SPH was estimated. Of the participants, 10.3% (95% confidence interval [CI]: 9.9-10.8) had poor SPH status. This proportion varied considerably across NDTs: From 6.4% (95% CI: 5.7-7.2) for Privileged Stable (most advantaged) to 16.4% (95% CI: 15.0-17.8) for Deprived Stable (most disadvantaged) trajectories. After adjustment, the likelihood of reporting poor SPH was significantly higher among participants assigned to a Deprived Upward (odds ratio [OR]: 1.77; 95% CI: 1.48-2.12), Average Downward (OR: 1.75; CI: 1.08-2.84) or Deprived trajectory (OR: 1.81; CI: 1.45-2.86), compared to the Privileged trajectory. Long-term exposure to neighbourhood deprivation may be a risk factor for poor SPH. Thus, NDT measures should be considered when selecting a target population for public-health-related interventions.

Self-perceived health status among adults with obesity in Quebec: a cluster analysis.

PURPOSE: People with obesity are a highly heterogeneous group. Characterizing this heterogeneity may help to improve public health by offering adapted interventions and treatments to more homogeneous sub-groups among obese patients. This research aims to (1) identify distinct clusters of people with obesity based on demographic, behavioural, and clinical factors in the province of Quebec (Canada) and (2) assess the association of these clusters with selfperceived health. METHODS: We conducted a sex specific cluster analysis (multiple correspondence analysis and hierarchical clustering) of adults with body mass index (BMI) ≥ 30 kg/m2 from the 2015-2016 Canadian Community Health Survey in Quebec. Clusters were based on demographic, clinical, and behavioural characteristics. The clusters were tested for association with poor selfperceived health using logistic regression. RESULTS: Three clusters of individuals with obesity were identified. These were (1) young individuals, (2) people with higher levels of depression and anxiety, and (3) older adults with high comorbidity. Those with high levels of depression and anxiety (9% of men vs. 13% of women) were associated with the poorest selfperceived health. CONCLUSIONS: People with obesity in Quebec can be categorized into three clusters based on demographic, clinical, and behavioural characteristics. The findings of this study draw attention to the need to examine the coexistence of obesity with depression and anxiety, particularly as it relates to selfperceived health.

Neighborhood deprivation and obesity: Sex-specific effects of cross-sectional, cumulative and residential trajectory indicators.

Obesity is a long-term health issue that is becoming increasingly prevalent. Very few studies have considered the life course effects of neighborhood characteristics on obesity. In a sample of 35,856 adult participants (representative of the population of the Province of Quebec in Canada), we measured the association between neighborhood deprivation and obesity using logistic modelling on indicators of cross-sectional neighborhood deprivation, cumulative neighborhood deprivation and trajectories of neighborhood deprivation. For cross-sectional exposure, we found that females in our sample had higher odds of being affected by obesity when living in high-deprivation (OR 1.73, CI 1.41-2.13) or medium-deprivation neighborhoods (OR 1.27, CI 1.07-1.51) compared to females living in low-deprivation neighborhoods. Males also had higher odds of being affected by obesity when living in medium or high deprivation. For cumulative exposure to neighborhood deprivation, only females in the second highest category for longitudinal exposure to deprived neighborhoods had significantly higher odds of living with obesity (OR 1.89 CI 1.12-3.19) compared to females in the low cumulative exposure category. Using sequence analysis to determine neighborhood deprivation trajectories for up to 17 years, we found that females with a Deprived upward (OR 1.75 CI 1.10-2.78), an Average downward (OR 1.75 CI 1.08-2.84) or a Deprived trajectory (OR 1.81 CI 1.45-2.86) had higher odds of living with obesity compared to the Privileged trajectory. For males, there were no significant associations. Using trajectory indicators was beneficial to our analyses because this method shows that not only are individuals in low socioeconomic status neighborhoods at the end of their trajectory more susceptible to living with obesity, but so are those exposed to neighborhood deprivation at the beginning of their trajectory. These results could help to more precisely identify individuals at higher risk of developing obesity-related health issues.

Examining longitudinal patterns of individual neighborhood deprivation trajectories in the province of Quebec: A sequence analysis application.

Exposure to neighborhood deprivation has been associated with a number of health, behavioral and sociological outcomes. However, many negative outcomes associated with deprivation have a long latency and may be influenced by varying exposure to neighborhoods throughout time. Capturing the longitudinal exposure to neighborhood deprivation is methodologically complex when one wishes to include life course notions of order, duration and timing. In a sample of 60,555 participants, aged 12 years and older (representative of the population of the Province of Quebec in Canada) our objectives were to: 1) Create an indicator for neighborhood deprivation trajectories; 2) compare trajectories with cross-sectional and cumulative neighborhood deprivation; 3) identify individual socioeconomic determinants of membership to a trajectory cluster. Using sequence analysis based on optimal matching and clustering around theoretical types, we grouped sequences in nine neighborhood deprivation trajectory clusters. We found that half (50%) of the participants were in a stable trajectory and did not transition significantly from one deprivation tertile to another during their sequence. A comparison between a cross-sectional indicator of neighborhood deprivation and the trajectories showed that only 42.2% of the participants had a cross-sectional deprivation at the index date representative of their whole trajectory. We also found, using logistic regression (adjusted for age, sex, number of residential moves) that having no high school diploma, living in a rural area and being an immigrant was strongly associated with a deprived stable trajectory. Sequence analysis is an effective tool to describe neighborhood deprivation trajectories in a sample representative of the Quebec population. Trajectories are a useful addition to a better understanding of the distribution of health outcomes because they provide information about the order and accumulation of longitudinal exposures to neighborhood and seem to be associated with specific individual socioeconomic characteristics such as education, urbanity, and immigration status.

Neighbourhood effects on obesity: scoping review of time-varying outcomes and exposures in longitudinal designs.

CONTEXT AND OBJECTIVES: Neighbourhood effect research on obesity took off in the early 2000s and was composed of mostly cross-sectional observational studies interested in various characteristics of the built environment and the socioeconomic environment. To limit biases related to self-selection and life course exposures, many researchers apply longitudinal designs in their studies. Until now, no review has specifically and exclusively examined longitudinal studies and the specific designs of these studies. In this review, we intend to answer the following research question: how are the temporal measurements of contextual exposure and obesity outcomes integrated into longitudinal studies that explore how neighbourhood-level built and socioeconomic environments impact adult obesity? DESIGN: A systematic search strategy was designed to address the research question. The search was performed in Embase, Web of Science and PubMed, targeting scientific papers published before 1 January 2018. The eligible studies reported results on adults, included exposure that was limited to neighbourhood characteristics at the submunicipal level, included an outcome limited to obesity proxies, and reported a design with at least two exposure measurements or two outcome measurements. RESULTS: This scoping review identified 66 studies that fit the eligibility criteria. A wide variety of neighbourhood characteristics were also measured, making it difficult to draw general conclusions about associations between neighbourhood exposure and obesity. We applied a typology that classified studies by whether exposure and outcome were measured as varying or fixed. Using this typology, we found that 32 studies reported both neighbourhood exposure and obesity outcomes that were varying in time; 28 reported varying outcomes but fixed exposures; and 6 had fixed outcomes and varying exposures. CONCLUSION: Our typology illustrates the variety of longitudinal designs that were used in the selected studies. In the light of our results, we make recommendations on how to better report longitudinal designs and facilitate comparisons between studies.

Longitudinal designs to study neighbourhood effects on the development of obesity: a scoping review protocol.

INTRODUCTION: The prevalence of obesity has increased significantly in the last three decades and became an important public health concern. Evidence of weight status variability at the neighbourhood level has led researchers to look more precisely at the characteristics of local geographic areas that might influence energy balance related behaviours, giving rise to the field of the 'neighbourhood effect' in public health research. Among an abundant literature about neighbourhood effects and obesity, we propose a protocol for a scoping review that will aim at determining how temporal measurements of residential neighbourhood exposure, individual covariates and weight outcome are integrated in longitudinal designs. METHODS AND ANALYSIS: A list of relevant citations will be obtained through a comprehensive systematic database search in Pubmed, Web of Science and Embase. The search strategy will be designed using a broad definition of neighbourhood to take into account the heterogeneity of this concept in research. Two investigators will screen titles, abstracts and entire publications using predetermined eligibility criteria yielding a list of selected publications. Data from the publications included in the scoping review will be charted according to bibliographic information, study population, exposure, outcomes and results. DISCUSSION AND CONCLUSION: To our knowledge, our protocol will yield the first scoping review regarding longitudinal designs of neighbourhood effect on obesity. Describing how longitudinal designs include temporal measurements of exposure, covariates and outcome is a necessary step in the quest to determine if or which contextual characteristics are likely to be involved in the development of obesity. Such information would bring new knowledge to complement current aetiological investigations and would contribute to enhancing resource allocation strategies for stakeholders in developing relevant interventions to prevent obesity and its negative impacts.

Does where you live matter? Leisure-time physical activity among Canadian youth: a multiple cross-sectional study.

BACKGROUND: The aim of this study was to explore the population-wide distribution in the practice of leisure-time physical activity among Canadian youth and how physical activity level is influenced by contextual features of the environment. METHODS: We studied the self-reported leisure-time physical activity of 54 832 Canadians aged 12 to 17 years. Observations were structured according to a 4-level geographic hierarchy. The outcome studied was a dichotomous indicator that referred to achieving (or not) the recommended daily level of leisure-time physical activity. To investigate the influence of the contextual features, we conducted multilevel logistic regressions. RESULTS: For both girls and boys, significant variations were observed between health regions and between neighbourhoods within the provinces. Girls who lived in an urban setting showed lower odds of achieving the recommended physical activity level, as did those surveyed during the winter. Boys surveyed during the winter also showed lower odds of achieving the recommended level, but living in an urban setting had no effect on activity levels. Analysis of province-level residuals showed that girls living in Quebec were less likely to achieve the recommended activity level as compared with the national mean, and girls living in Ontario and British Columbia were more likely to achieve that threshold. Boys living in Ontario were more likely to achieve the recommended activity level as compared with the national mean. Youth had up to a 17% increased chance of achieving the recommended physical activity level if they lived in a context with a higher activity achievement level. INTERPRETATION: Leisure-time physical activity was associated with environmental factors at multiple geographic scales among Canadian youth. The variation was more important at the neighbourhood level. The results provide rationale for further investigation into how leisure-time physical activity is promoted in different contexts.

Active Travel by Built Environment and Lifecycle Stage: Case Study of Osaka Metropolitan Area.

Active travel can contribute to physical activity achieved over a day. Previous studies have examined active travel associated with trips in various western countries, but few studies have examined this question for the Asian context. Japan has high levels of cycling, walking and public transport, similar to The Netherlands. Most studies have focused either on children or on adults separately, however, having children in a household will change the travel needs and wants of that household. Thus, here a household lifecycle stage approach is applied. Further, unlike many previous studies, the active travel related to public transport is included. Lastly, further to examining whether the built environment has an influence on the accumulation of active travel minutes, a binary logistic regression examines the built environment's influence on the World Health Organization's recommendations of physical activity. The findings suggest that there is a clear distinction between the urbanized centers and the surrounding towns and unurbanized areas. Further, active travel related to public transport trips is larger than pure walking trips. Females and children are more likely to achieve the WHO recommendations. Finally, car ownership is a strong negative influence.