Gender inequalities in the prevalence of low mood and related factors in schooled adolescents during the 2019-2020 school year: DESKcohort project.

BACKGROUND: Mood disorders are the second most prevalent mental disorders in childhood and adolescence. Many undiagnosed people manifest subthreshold symptoms, like low mood, and present worse prognoses than asymptomatic healthy subjects. The aim of this study was to estimate the prevalence of low mood, gender inequalities, and associated factors, in 12- to 18-year-old adolescents in the rural and medium-sized urban areas of Central Catalonia during the 2019-2020 academic year. METHODS: Cross-sectional study with data from a cohort of high-schooled students (2019-2020), with a convenience sample of 6428 adolescents from the Central region of Catalonia (48.3 % boys and 51.7 % girls). Prevalence of low mood was estimated by gender and exposure variables, and ratios were obtained using Poisson regression models, adjusting for several exposure variables one by one, and for all of them jointly. RESULTS: The prevalence of low mood was 18.6 %, with statistically significant differences between genders (11.6 %, 95 % CI: 10.5-12.8 in boys and 25.1 %, 95 % CI: 23.7-26.6 in girls). Being an immigrant, dieting, and daily tobacco smoking were only associated with low mood in girls, whereas risky alcohol consumption was only associated in boys. Sexual violence was found to account for 36.2 % of low mood problems in girls. LIMITATIONS: The main limitation of the study is its cross-sectional design, which means that no casual relationships can be extracted of this study. CONCLUSIONS: The prevalence of low mood varies between the sexes, highlighting the importance of developing gender-specific interventions to reduce its incidence in young people, considering the factors associated with this condition.

[Assessment of the consensus document on food in educational centres to evaluate school menus]. / Valoración del documento de consenso sobre alimentación en centros educativos para evaluar menús escolares.

OBJECTIVE: To explore the applicability of the Consensus Document on School Food Programmes in Educational Centres (DCSECE) to evaluate the adaptation of school menus to healthy eating recommendations. METHOD: Transversal study that analyzes monthly school menus from 28 early-childhood education and primary education centres in Andalusia and Canary Islands (Spain). Data were collected using an ad-hoc protocol based on the DCSECE recommendations and divided into food categories and subcategories. We studied the weekly menu offering of each of the foods by category and subcategory and compared them to the DCSECE recommendations. RESULTS: The majority of the schools offered better meals than as specified by the recommendations, in terms of vegetables, other garnishes and other deserts. They offered poorer quality meals in the categories of rice, pasta, prepared foods and salads, and had an equivalent offering in terms of pulses, meats, fish and eggs. By subcategory, we observed the predominance of cooked vegetables in the vegetable category as compared to salads, and the predominance of processed meats in the meats category. CONCLUSIONS: The DCSECE could be a useful instrument for evaluating the nutritional offering of school menus. However, there is a need for greater specificity in the recommendations, in order to identify whether these menus adhere to healthy eating recommendations.

Sentinel Amenable Mortality: A New Way to Assess the Quality of Healthcare by Examining Causes of Premature Death for Which Highly Efficacious Medical Interventions Are Available.

BACKGROUND: Amenable mortality, or premature deaths that could be prevented with medical care, is a proven indicator for assessing healthcare quality when adapted to a country or region's specific healthcare context. This concept is currently used to evaluate the performance of national and international healthcare systems. However, the levels of efficacy and effectiveness determined using this indicator can vary greatly depending on the causes of death that are included. We introduce a new approach by identifying a subgroup of causes for which there are available treatments with a high level of efficacy. These causes should be considered sentinel events to help identify limitations in the effectiveness and quality of health provision. METHODS: We conducted an extensive literature review using a list of amenable causes of death compiled by Spanish researchers. We complemented this approach by assessing the time trends of amenable mortality in two high-income countries that have a similar quality of healthcare but very different systems of provision, namely, Spain and the United States. This enabled us to identify different levels of efficacy of medical interventions (high, medium, and low). We consulted a group of medical experts and combined this information to help make the final classification of sentinel amenable causes of death. RESULTS: Sentinel amenable mortality includes causes such as surgical conditions, thyroid diseases, and asthma. The remaining amenable causes of death either have a higher complexity in terms of the disease or need more effective medical interventions or preventative measures to guarantee early detection and adherence to treatment. These included cardiovascular diseases, diabetes, hypertension, all amenable cancers, and some infectious diseases such as pneumonia, influenza, and tuberculosis. CONCLUSIONS: Sentinel amenable mortality could act as a good sentinel indicator to identify major deficiencies in healthcare quality and provision and detect inequalities across populations.

Interpersonal and institutional ethnic discrimination, and mental health in a random sample of Palestinian minority men smokers in Israel.

PURPOSE: We sought to extend research into the health effects of discrimination to a non-Western context. We examined the associations between interpersonal and institutional ethnic discrimination, and anxiety and depression among Palestinian-Arab minority men citizens of Israel. METHODS: We used data from a nationwide stratified random sample of 964 Arab men in Israel, current or former smokers (age 18-64), who were interviewed as part of a 2012-2013 study on cessation. The questionnaire included an adapted Arabic version of the Experiences of Discrimination scale and a new scale on perceived institutional group discrimination. Logistic regression models estimated the effects of both forms of discrimination on depressive symptoms (Center for Epidemiological Studies Depression Scale) and anxiety (State-Trait Anxiety Inventory), while adjusting for socio-demographic and economic factors. RESULTS: The prevalence of depressive symptoms was 24.7% and anxiety 45.5%. Approximately 42% of men reported experiencing interpersonal discrimination, and 50.8% reported perceived institutional group discrimination. Controlling for covariates, experiencing interpersonal discrimination was associated with higher odds for depressive symptoms [OR = 2.36, 95% confidence intervals (CI) = 1.69-1.57] and anxiety (OR = 1.92, 95% CI = 1.45-2.55). Perceived institutional group discrimination was associated only with anxiety (OR = 1.76, 95% CI = 1.32-2.35). Introducing both forms of discrimination into the same model slightly attenuated these associations. CONCLUSIONS: Interpersonal and institutional forms of ethnic discrimination are independently associated with poorer mental health among Arab minority men current and former smokers in Israel. Future research is warranted into both forms of discrimination in the general Arab population in Israel, including women.

South-South cooperation in health: bringing in theory, politics, history, and social justice / A cooperação Sul-Sul em saúde: trazendo perspectivas teóricas, políticas, históricas e de justiça social / Cooperación Sur-Sur en salud: aportando perspectivas teóricas, políticas, históricas y de justicia social

Abstract: Since the mid-2000s, the practice of South-South cooperation in health (SSC) has attracted growing attention among policymakers, health and foreign affairs ministries, global health agencies, and scholars from a range of fields. But the South-South label elucidates little about the actual content of the cooperation and conflates the "where" with the "who, what, how, and why". While there have been some attempts to theorize global health diplomacy and South-South cooperation generally, these efforts do not sufficiently distinguish among the different kinds of practices and political values that fall under the South-South rubric, ranging from economic and geopolitical interests to social justice forms of solidarity. In the spirit of deepening theoretical, historical, and social justice analyses of SSC, this article: (1) critically revisits international relations theories that seek to explain SSC, exploring Marxian and other heterodox theories ignored in the mainstream literature; (2) traces the historical provenance of a variety of forms of SSC; and (3) introduces the concept of social justice-oriented South-South.

Resumo: Desde meados da primeira década do século XXI, a cooperação Sul-Sul em saúde (CSS) vem atraindo cada vez mais atenção entre gestores, ministérios da saúde e das relações exteriores, agências de saúde global, e pesquisadores de diversas disciplinas. Não obstante, o uso do termo "Sul-Sul" para caracterizar essa prática explica pouco sobre o conteúdo da cooperação, além de misturar o "onde?" com o "quem, quê, como e por quê?". Já houve algumas tentativas de teorizar a diplomacia da saúde global e a cooperação Sul-Sul geralmente, mas esses esforços têm sido insuficientes no sentido de distinguir as diversas práticas e valores políticos sob a rubrica Sul- Sul, desde os intereses econômicos e geopolíticos até a solidariedade e a justiça social. No espírito de aprofundar as análises políticas, teóricas, históricas, e de justiça social nas discussões sobre a CSS, o artigo: (1) revisita criticamente as teorias de relações internacionais que podem explicar a CSS, explorando teorias en la tradição Marxista e heterodoxas ignoradas na literatura convencional; (2) identifica as origens históricas das diferentes formas dessa cooperação; e (3) introduz o conceito da cooperação Sul-Sul orientada a la justiça social.

Resumen: Desde mediados de los años 2000, la práctica de la cooperación Sur-Sur en salud (CSS) ha recibido una creciente atención entre formuladores de políticas, ministerios de salud y de asuntos exteriores, organismos internacionales de salud y académicos provenientes de un gran abanico de campos científicos. Sin embargo, la denominación cooperación Sur-Sur poco dilucida acerca del contenido real de la cooperación y mezcla el "dónde" con el "quién, qué, cómo, y el por qué". A pesar de que han habido algunos intentos de teorizar sobre la diplomacia en la salud global y la cooperación Sur-Sur en general, estos esfuerzos no han identificado de manera suficiente los distintos tipos de prácticas y los diferentes valores políticos que caen en la rúbrica de CSS, y que incluyen desde los intereses económicos y geopolíticos hasta las formas de solidaridad fieles a la justicia social. Con el ánimo de ahondar en los análisis políticos, teóricos, históricos y de justicia social de la CSS, este artículo: (1) vuelve a examinar críticamente las teorías sobre las relaciones internacionales que intentan explicar la CSS, explorando teorías en la tradición Marxista y otras teorías heterodoxas, que han sido ignoradas en la literatura convencional; (2) rastrea los orígenes históricos de distintas formas de CSS; y (3) presenta el concepto de cooperación Sur-Sur orientada por la justicia social.

Global precarious employment and health inequalities: working conditions, social class, or precariat? / Emprego precário no mundo e desigualdades em saúde: condições de trabalho, classe social ou precariado? / Empleo global precario e inequidades en salud: ¿condiciones laborales, clase social, o "precariado"?

Abstract: Changes in employment conditions since the 1980s have been referred to as precarious employment, and terms like flexible, atypical, temporary, part-time, contract, self-employed, irregular, or non-standard employment have also been used. In this essay I review some of the current critiques to the precarious employment construct and advance some potential solutions for its use in epidemiology and public health.

Resumo: Mudanças nas condições de emprego desde os anos 1980s têm sido chamadas de "emprego precário", além de outros termos como trabalho flexível, atípico, temporário, em tempo parcial, por contrato, autônomo ou irregular. O ensaio faz uma revisão de algumas das críticas atuais em relação ao conceito de emprego precário e propõe soluções para seu uso na epidemiologia e em saúde pública.

Resumen: Tras los cambios en las condiciones laborales desde los años 1980s se ha hecho uso de conceptos como empleo precario, así como de términos como: flexible, atípico, temporal, a tiempo parcial, contrato basura, auto-empleado, irregular, o empleo no convencional. En este trabajo se realizó una revisión sobre algunas de las actuales críticas hacia el constructo del empleo precario y se avanzaron algunas soluciones potenciales para su uso en epidemiología y salud pública.

The impact of job strain on smoking cessation and relapse in the Canadian population: a cohort study.

BACKGROUND: The aim of this study is to investigate the impact of job strain, as measured by the Karasek demand/control model (DCM), on smoking cessation and relapse in a representative general population sample. METHODS: A secondary analysis of data from the Canadian National Population Health Survey (NPHS) was undertaken. Daily smokers and former daily smokers (n=1287 and 1184, respectively) at cycle 1 (1994/1995) of the NPHS were followed up at cycle 2 (1996/1997). Measures of job strain (the independent variables) were based on data from cycle 1, predicting smoking status at cycle 2. Logistic regression analysis was employed in two ways. Individuals were stratified into job strain quartiles while continuous measures were also employed in separate analyses for job strain and its component dimensions. RESULTS: In the quartile analysis, no effect of job strain was observed on the likelihood of cessation, while a non-linear effect was observed on the likelihood of relapse, although this relationship lost significance (p>0.05 and <0.10) after controlling for personal characteristics. No effect was observed using the continuous measure of job strain or the continuous measure of job demand on either cessation or relapse. For job control, no effect was observed on the likelihood of cessation, but increased control was found to decrease the likelihood of relapse in the unadjusted model only. CONCLUSIONS: Psychosocial work environments may be too diverse for uniform trends in the relationship between job stress and smoking behaviour to emerge in a population sample. Future research should avoid use of the scaled-down DCM instrument where possible.

Clase social, factores de riesgo psicosocial en el trabajo y su asociación con la salud autopercibida y mental en Chile / Social class, psychosocial occupational risk factors, and the association with self-rated health and mental health in Chile / Classe social, fatores psicossociais de risco ocupacional e sua associação com saúde autopercebida e mental no Chile

El objetivo fue examinar la relación entre clase social, riesgo psicosocial laboral y la salud autopercibida y mental en Chile. Se trata de un estudio transversal con los datos de la Primera Encuesta Nacional de Condiciones de Empleo, Trabajo, Calidad de Vida y Salud de los Trabajadores y Trabajadoras en Chile (N = 9.503). Las variables dependientes son: salud mental y salud autopercibida. Las variables explicativas son: clase social neo-marxista, factores de riesgo psicosocial y privación material. Se realizaron análisis descriptivos y de regresión logística. Existen desigualdades en la distribución de los factores exposición laboral a riesgos psicosociales, según clase social y sexo. Además, la clase social y los factores de riesgo psicosocial en el trabajo están asociados a una distribución desigual de la salud autopercibida y salud mental entre la población trabajadora en Chile. Las intervenciones en el área de la salud de los trabajadores deben considerar la clase social y los factores de riesgo psicosocial a que están expuestos los trabajadores.

The objective of this study was to analyze the association between social class and psychosocial occupational risk factors and self-rated health and mental health in a Chilean population. A cross-sectional study analyzed data from the First National Survey on Employment, Work, Quality of Life, and Male and Female Workers in Chile (N = 9,503). The dependent variables were self-rated health status and mental health. The independent variables were social class (neo-Marxist), psychosocial occupational risk factors, and material deprivation. Descriptive and logistic regression analyses were performed. There were inequalities in the distribution of psychosocial occupational risk factors by social class and sex. Furthermore, social class and psychosocial occupational risk factors were associated with unequal distribution of self-rated health and mental health among the working population in Chile. Occupational health interventions should consider workers’ exposure to socioeconomic and psychosocial risk factors.

O objetivo foi analisar a associação entre classe social, fatores psicossociais de risco laboral e saúde autopercebida e saúde mental entre a população trabalhadora chilena. Estudo transversal com os dados da Primera Encuesta Nacional de Condiciones de Empleo, Trabajo, Calidad de Vida y Salud de los trabajadores y trabajadoras en Chile (N = 9.503). As variáveis dependentes são: saúde autopercebida e saúde mental. As variáveis explicativas são a classe social (neo-marxista), os fatores psicossociais de risco laboral e privação material. Foram realizadas análises descritivas e de regressão logística. Existem desigualdades na distribuição dos fatores psicossociais de risco laboral segundo classe social e sexo. Além disso, a classe social e os fatores de risco psicossociais no trabalho estão associados a uma distribuição desigual da saúde autopercebida e saúde mental. As intervenções na área da saúde dos trabalhadores devem considerar a classe social e fatores de risco psicossociais a que os trabalhadores estão expostos.

[Social class, health inequalities, and health-related behaviors of working people in Chile]. / Clase social, desigualdades en saludy conductas relacionadas con la saludde la población trabajadora en Chile.

OBJECTIVE: To analyze links between social class and health-related indicators and behaviors in Chilean workers, from a neo-Marxian perspective. METHODS: A cross-sectional study based on the First National Survey on Employment, Work, Health, and Quality of Life of Workers in Chile, done in 2009-2010 (n = 9 503). Dependent variables were self-perceived health status and mental health, examined using the General Health Questionnaire (GHQ-12). Health-related behavior variables included tobacco use and physical activity. The independent variable was neo-Marxian social class. Descriptive analyses of prevalence were performed and odds ratio (OR) models and 95% confidence intervals (95%CI) were estimated. RESULTS: Medium employers (between 2 and 10 employees) reported a lower prevalence of poor health (21.6% [OR 0.68; 95%CI 0.46-0.99]). Unskilled managers had the lowest mental health risk (OR 0.43; 95%CI 0.21-0.88), with differences between men and women. Large employers (more than 10 employees) reported smoking the least, while large employers, expert supervisors, and semi-skilled workers engaged in significantly more physical activity. CONCLUSIONS: Large employers and expert managers have the best health-related indicators and behaviors. Formal proletarians, informal proletarians, and unskilled supervisors, however, have the worst general health indicators, confirming that social class is a key determinant in the generation of population health inequalities.

Clase social, desigualdades en salud y conductas relacionadas con la salud de la población trabajadora en Chile / Social class, health inequalities, and health-related behaviors of working people in Chile

OBJETIVO: Analizar los vínculos entre la clase social y los diferentes indicadores y conductas relacionados con la salud, a partir de una perspectiva neomarxista en población trabajadora chilena. MÉTODOS: Se realizó un estudio transversal a partir de la Primera Encuesta Nacional de Condiciones de Empleo, Trabajo, Salud y Calidad de Vida de los Trabajadores y Trabajadoras en Chile, efectuada en 2009-2010 (n = 9 503). Las variables dependientes fueron el estado de salud autopercibido y la salud mental, examinada mediante el Cuestionario de Salud Global (GHQ-12, por sus siglas en inglés). Las variables de conductas relacionadas con la salud incluyeron el consumo de tabaco y la realización de actividad física. La variable independiente fue la clase social neomarxista. Se realizaron análisis descriptivos de prevalencia y se estimaron modelos de razón de probabilidades (RP) e intervalos de confianza de 95% (IC95%). RESULTADOS: Los medianos empresarios refirieron tener una menor prevalencia de mala salud (21,6% [RP 0,68; IC95% 0,46-0,99]). En relación a la salud mental, los que presentaban menor riesgo eran los gerentes básicos (RP 0,43; IC95% 0,21-0,88), observándose diferencias entre hombres y mujeres. Los que refirieron fumar con menor frecuencia fueron los empresarios, mientras que los que realizaban significativamente más actividad física fueron los empresarios, los supervisores expertos y los trabajadores semicalificados. CONCLUSIONES: Los empresarios y gerentes expertos son los que presentan mejores indicadores y conductas relacionados con la salud. El proletario formal, el proletario informal y los supervisores básicos, en cambio, son los que presentan los peores indicadores de salud global, confirmando así que la clase social es un determinante clave en la generación de desigualdades en materia de salud de la población.

OBJECTIVE: To analyze links between social class and health-related indicators and behaviors in Chilean workers, from a neo-Marxian perspective. METHODS: A cross-sectional study based on the First National Survey on Employment, Work, Health, and Quality of Life of Workers in Chile, done in 2009-2010 (n = 9 503). Dependent variables were self-perceived health status and mental health, examined using the General Health Questionnaire (GHQ-12). Health-related behavior variables included tobacco use and physical activity. The independent variable was neo-Marxian social class. Descriptive analyses of prevalence were performed and odds ratio (OR) models and 95% confidence intervals (95%CI) were estimated. RESULTS: Medium employers (between 2 and 10 employees) reported a lower prevalence of poor health (21.6% [OR 0.68; 95%CI 0.46-0.99]). Unskilled managers had the lowest mental health risk (OR 0.43; 95%CI 0.21-0.88), with differences between men and women. Large employers (more than 10 employees) reported smoking the least, while large employers, expert supervisors, and semi-skilled workers engaged in significantly more physical activity. CONCLUSIONS: Large employers and expert managers have the best health-related indicators and behaviors. Formal proletarians, informal proletarians, and unskilled supervisors, however, have the worst general health indicators, confirming that social class is a key determinant in the generation of population health inequalities.

Welfare state regimes, gender, and depression: a multilevel analysis of middle and high income countries.

Using the 2002 World Health Survey, we examine the association between welfare state regimes, gender and mental health among 26 countries classified into seven distinct regimes: Conservative, Southeast Asian, Eastern European, Latin American, Liberal, Southern/Ex-dictatorship, and Social Democratic. A two-level hierarchical model found that the odds of experiencing a brief depressive episode in the last 12 months was significantly higher for Southern/Ex- dictatorship countries than for Southeast Asian (odds ratio (OR) = 0.12, 95% confidence interval (CI) 0.05-0.27) and Eastern European (OR = 0.36, 95% CI 0.22-0.58) regimes after controlling for gender, age, education, marital status, and economic development. In adjusted interaction models, compared to Southern/Ex-dictatorship males (reference category), the odds ratios of depression were significantly lower among Southeast Asian males (OR = 0.16, 95% CI 0.08-0.34) and females (OR = 0.23, 95% CI 0.10-0.53) and Eastern European males (OR = 0.41, 95% CI 0.26-0.63) and significantly higher among females in Liberal (OR = 2.00, 95% CI 1.14-3.49) and Southern (OR = 2.42, 95% CI 1.86-3.15) regimes. Our results highlight the importance of incorporating middle-income countries into comparative welfare regime research and testing for interactions between welfare regimes and gender on mental health.

Improving health equity through theory-informed evaluations: a look at housing first strategies, cross-sectoral health programs, and prostitution policy.

The emergent realist perspective on evaluation is instructive in the quest to use theory-informed evaluations to reduce health inequities. This perspective suggests that in addition to knowing whether a program works, it is imperative to know 'what works for whom in what circumstances and in what respects, and how?' (Pawson & Tilley, 1997). This addresses the important issue of heterogeneity of effect, in other words, that programs have different effects for different people, potentially even exacerbating inequities and worsening the situation of marginalized groups. But in addition, the realist perspective implies that a program may not only have a greater or lesser effect, but even for the same effect, it may work by way of a different mechanism, about which we must theorize, for different groups. For this reason, theory, and theory-based evaluations are critical to health equity. We present here three examples of evaluations with a focus on program theories and their links to inequalities. All three examples illustrate the importance of theory-based evaluations in reducing health inequities. We offer these examples from a wide variety of settings to illustrate that the problem of which we write is not an exception to usual practice. The 'Housing First' model of supportive housing for people with severe mental illness is based on a theory of the role of housing in living with mental illness that has a number of elements that directly contradict the theory underlying the dominant model. Multisectoral action theories form the basis for the second example on Venezuela's revolutionary national Barrio Adentro health improvement program. Finally, decriminalization of prostitution and related health and safety policies in New Zealand illustrate how evaluations can play an important role in both refining the theory and contributing to improved policy interventions to address inequalities. The theoretically driven and transformative nature of these interventions create special demands for the use of theory in evaluations.

The effects of a psychosocial dimension of socioeconomic position on survival: occupational prestige and mortality among US working adults.

The association between education or income and mortality has been explored in great detail. These measures capture both the effects of material disadvantage on health and the psychosocial impacts of a low socioeconomic position on health. When explored independently of educational attainment and income, occupational prestige - a purely perceptual measure - serves as a measure of the impact of a psychosocial phenomenon on health. For instance, a fire-fighter, academician or schoolteacher may carry the social benefits of a higher social status without actually having the income (in all cases) or the educational credentials (in the case of the fire-fighter) to match. We explored the independent influence of occupational prestige on mortality. We applied Cox proportional hazards models to a nationally representative sample of over 380,000 US workers who had worked at any time between 1986 and 1994 with mortality follow up through 2002. We found that occupational prestige is associated with a decrease in the risk of all-cause, cancer, cardiovascular and respiratory-related mortality after controlling for household income and educational attainment. We further investigated the question of whether the effects of prestige are moderated by sex and broader occupational groupings. Prestige effects operate in white-collar occupations for men only and within service occupations for all workers.

Health status and risk indicator trends of the aging US health care workforce.

OBJECTIVES: To describe the health status and risk indicator trends in a representative sample of US health care workers aged 45 years and older. METHODS: Using pooled data from the 1997 to 2009 National Health Interview Survey, logistic regression analyses were performed to determine whether age-group specific morbidity risks differed within occupational subgroups of the health care workforce (N = 6509). Health and morbidity trends were examined via complex survey adjusted and weighted chi-squared tests. RESULTS: Rates of functional limitation and hypertension increased among diagnosing/assessing health care workers. The prevalence of hearing impairment, cancer, and hypertension was two to three times greater in health-diagnosing/assessing workers aged 60 years and older than in younger workers. Health care service workers were up to 19 times more likely to be obese than workers who diagnose/assess health. CONCLUSIONS: Healthier workplaces and targeted interventions are needed to optimize the ability to meet health care demands of this aging workforce.

Clase social y salud en América Latina / Social class and health in Latin America

Se repasan los principales conceptos de clase social, ocupación y estratificación social, y su contribución al análisis de los determinantes sociales de la salud (DSS), y se revisan los estudios empíricos desarrollados en América Latina que utilicen las relaciones de empleo como DSS. La revisión se ha enfocado en los estudios sobre la relación entre salud y clase social basados en las perspectivas neoweberiana o neomarxista. La búsqueda en la Biblioteca Virtual en Salud de BIREME y en la base de datos SciELO permitió localizar 28 artículos de esas características. Esta relativa escasez contrasta con la abundancia de trabajos con tales enfoques realizados en Europa y en los Estados Unidos, con una larga tradición en el análisis de los DSS. En tal sentido, las implicaciones políticas y programáticas de la investigación sobre clase social y relaciones de empleo son diferentes y complementarias de los estudios de gradientes de salud asociados a los ingresos y la educación. La globalización en las relaciones de empleo exige nuevos conceptos para explicar y medir los mecanismos de acción de los DSS trascendiendo lo estrictamente laboral; en particular, la relevancia en la realidad latinoamericana actual del impacto del trabajo informal sobre la salud.

This paper reviews the principal concepts of social class, occupation, and social stratification, and their contribution to the analysis of the social determinants of health (SDH), and reviews empirical studies conducted in Latin America that use employment relations as an SDH. The review focuses on studies of the relationship between health and social class based on neo-Weberian or neo-Marxist perspectives. A search of the BIREME Virtual Health Library and the SciELO database found 28 articles meeting these characteristics. This relative dearth contrasts with the profusion of papers that use these approaches written in Europe and in the United States, with a long tradition in the analysis of SDH. In this regard, the political and programmatic implications of research on social class and employment relations are different from and complementary to studies of health gradients associated with income and education. Globalization of employment relations requires the development of new concepts to explain and measure the mechanisms of action of the SDH going beyond what is strictly labor related; in particular, the importance in the current Latin American reality of the impact of informal work on health.

Health indicators among unemployed and employed young adults.

OBJECTIVE: Research on the prevalence of health indicators by employment status among young US adults is limited. METHODS: We analyzed data from a nationally representative sample of young adults aged 18 to 24 years to document the prevalence of five health behaviors (cigarette smoking, risky drinking, leisure-time physical activity, and fruit and French fries consumption) by employment status. RESULTS: Unemployed young adults reported higher levels of risky drinking and nonengagement in leisure-time physical activity, while employed young adults had higher levels of smoking, French fries consumption, and low fruit/vegetable consumption. Transportation/material-moving young adult workers reported the highest level of risky drinking (13.5%), and precision production/craft/repair workers reported the highest smoking rates (39.7%). CONCLUSIONS: We found an elevated prevalence of risk factors, which places young workers at increased risk for the development of chronic conditions later in life.

Examining associations between job characteristics and health: linking data from the Occupational Information Network (O*NET) to two U.S. national health surveys.

OBJECTIVE: To determine whether the Occupational Information Network (O*NET) database can be used to identify job dimensions to serve as proxy measures for psychosocial factors and select environmental factors, and to determine whether these factors could be linked to national health surveys to examine associations with health risk behaviors and outcomes. METHODS: Job characteristics were obtained from O*NET 98. Health outcomes were obtained from two national surveys. Data were linked using Bureau of Census codes. Multiple logistic regression was used to examine associations between O*NET factors and cardiovascular disease, depression, and health risk factors. RESULTS: Seven of nine work organization or psychosocial factors were significantly associated with health risk behaviors in both the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey III and National Health Interview Survey. CONCLUSIONS: This study demonstrates a method for linking independently obtained health and job characteristic data based on occupational code.

Gender, precarious work, and chronic diseases in South Korea.

OBJECTIVE: In view of the growing number of nonstandard workers in South Korea, this study examined whether nonstandard workers reported poorer health compared to standard workers and assessed whether there were gender differences in the association between employment status and chronic health outcomes. METHOD: Data were taken from a representative-weighted sample of 1,563 men and 1,045 women aged 20-64, from the 2001 National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey. Nonstandard employment included part-time work, temporary work, and day labor. Self-rated health and self-reported chronic disease conditions were used as health measures. MAIN RESULTS: Nonstandard employment was significantly associated with higher risk of self-rated health and chronic conditions after adjusting for socioeconomic position (education, occupational class, and income) and health behaviors (cigarette smoking, alcohol consumption, regular exercise, and health examinations). However, the pattern in the relation between nonstandard work and specific health problems greatly differed by gender. Among men, nonstandard work arrangements were significantly associated with musculoskeletal disorders (OR 1.97, 95% CI 1.24-3.19) and liver disease (OR 2.83, 95% CI 1.27-6.32). Among women, nonstandard employment was related to mental disorders (OR 3.25, 95% CI 1.40-7.56). CONCLUSION: The findings clearly indicate the need for further study of the observed associations, particularly prospective and analytical studies.