Poster session on Health, mortality and longevity (1)

Diabetes is seen as a global epidemic inflicting millions, mostly in developing nations and disadvantaged groups in developed nations. In the Philippines, about 3-4 million are believed to have diabetes. Worse, another 3-4 million may be at risk or already have this deadly condition but do not know it.

Patients with Type 2 Diabetes Mellitus (T2DM) have multiple responsibilities, including lifestyle modifications, dietary restrictions, self-monitoring of glucose levels, screening for complications, and adherence to medications. Depressive conditions, eating disorders, poor family relationships, and other psychological problems are common in patients and are associated with poor glycemic control. Studies have shown that family support has a great impact on management of diseases. In this light, this study aims to explore the relationship between family dysfunction and the glycemic control.

The study sample includes 68 patients of Angono General Hospital and Taytay Emergency Hospital with T2DM from September to November 2009. Both descriptive and inferential analyses were utilized in the study. The results show that there is an association between family function and the management of diabetes. This indicates that the family, as a source of support is an integral part in managing disease, particularly

The utilization of health care services by women during pregnancy and child birth is low in Nigeria, with only 35% of delivery taking place in health facility and 62 % of births take place at home. This situation not only leads to high maternal mortality in but puts Nigeria in the second position of countries with highest maternal mortality, just after India. Reduction in maternal deaths has been hindered not only by the absence of good health facilities but by socio-cultural factors prevalent within the society. This paper examined the socio-cultural factors which are least studied, especially which encourage male domination and lower status of women. Respondents consist of 458 women attending antenatal care clinic in State Hospital Ota were randomly selected and interviewed with the aid of questionnaire instrument. The data generated were analyzed using SPSS. The findings showed family type, respondent’s education, perception of cost of antenatal service, treatment place decision, husband perception of pregnancy, respondents dependency on husband for health facility visitation and service satisfaction are significant (P= .000, .023, .001, .005, .000, .000, .000) towards use of health care services by mothers. Recommendations were provided for improving maternal health delivery services in study area and beyond.

To reduce child mortality rates, the government of Ghana conducts both routine and supplemental immunization activities. National Immunization Day (NID) campaigns aim to address gaps in routine child immunization coverage by providing vaccinations to children who were not reached by routine vaccination services. While vaccination coverage has improved considerably since the start of biannual NID campaign, these improvements have not been consistent. This implies that the NID campaigns – although invaluable – have not been able to completely fill the gaps in routine vaccination coverage.

This study analyzes data from the 2008 Ghana Demographic and Health Survey to examine the factors that affected participation in two recent NID campaigns. The results suggest that about one third of children aged 6-23 months participated in each campaign. However, children from wealthier backgrounds appear to have higher participation rates than children from more disadvantaged backgrounds.

Large body of health literature has extensively reported the linearly aligned education gradient supporting thick theoretical building on the education gradient that has become one of few established facts. In this draft, we attempt to describe apparently contradictory empirical observations to the gradient argument: the recipients of the General Educational Development (GED) certificate. The NHIS data show that GED recipients enjoyed no advantage in the global health status measured by self-reported health over high school dropouts, which do not appear support the widely accepted education gradient. More rigorous analyses using the Add Health indicated that GED recipients who took GED credentials approximately seven years after high school enjoyed health benefits compared to high school dropouts but these benefits watered down six years later. GED credentials by 13 years after high school, however, did not make any distinguishable health differentials. We argue that these observations are related to psychological distress due to low socioeconomic status GED recipients went through in labor market.

Objective: This study intended to explore the association among disease/ medical conditions with functional limitation or disability among Taiwanese older people.
Method: The data were from the 2009 Taiwan National Health Interview Survey (NHIS). A total of 2900 participants aged 65+ years who responded to all ADL items were included. Disability was defined by reported “severe” or “profound” difficulty on any ADL item. A total of 17 diseases/ medical conditions were asked and the prevalence of each item in the disabled population was calculated.
Results: Among all participants, 10.3% categorized as “having disability”. The leading conditions associated with disability among Taiwanese older people were hypertension (57.2%), hearing problem (40.4%), stroke(32.8%), osteoporosis(32.2%), diabetes(27.8%), heart related disease(21.3%), hyperlipidemia(20.5%) and arthritis(14.2).
Discussion: The results showed that the most common disease among older people with disability is hypertension, followed by other conditions that also strongly associated life-style like, stroke, diabetes, hyperlipidemia etc.
Conclusion: The results once again supported that it is considered to be more promising and up-streaming to deal with behavioral risk factors or lifestyles while facing the issue of disability in older age.

This paper focuses on percentage of childhood death among Hindu-Muslim (religion) in India and its selected regions. Sex differentials in infant and child death reflect strong son preference in many regions. Most regions exhibit excess male death during the neonatal period but excess female death during childhood. In the country as a whole, female child death is 40 percent higher than male child death. The sex differentials in infant and child death suggest that son preference and discrimination against female children are very strong in northern states but minimal or nonexistent in southern states. Among socioeconomic background characteristics, urban/rural residence, mother’s exposure to mass media, and Mother’s literacy, access to a flush or pit toilet are found to have substantial unadjusted effects on infant and child death, but these effects are much smaller when the effects of other socioeconomic variables and basic demographic factors are controlled. Wealth index, birth interval, women age at first birth, household head’s religion and economic level of the household have substantial and often statistically significant adjusted effects on infant and child mortality. Both unadjusted and adjusted effects of most of these background characteristics are largest for child mortality and smallest for neonatal death.

Studies on the causes of maternal mortality in India have focused on institutional deliveries, and the association of socioeconomic and demographic factors with the decline in maternal mortality has not been sufficiently investigated. By using both time series and cross-sectional data, this paper examines the factors associated with the decline in maternal mortality in India. Relative effects estimated by OLS regression analysis reveal that per capita state net domestic product (1.49611, p<0.05), poverty ratio (0.02426, p<0.05), female literacy rate (0.05905, p<0.10), infant mortality rate and total fertility rate (0.11755, p<0.05) are statistically significantly associated with the decline in the maternal mortality ratio in India. The Barro regression estimate reveals that improvements in economic and demographic conditions such as growth in state income (β=0.35020, p<0.05) and reduction in poverty (β=0.01867, p<0.01) and fertility (β=0.02598, p<0.05) have a greater association with the decline in the maternal mortality ratio in India than institutional deliveries (β=0.00305).

By applying the cluster analysis technique and Heligman-Pollard mortality model, the present paper aims to study the regional variations in mortality age patterns of EAG states including Assam in India for the most recent period 2010-11. The study exploited data from sample registration system 1996-2010 and Annual Health Survey 2010-11. It discovers the four clusters explaining different patterns of age specific mortality. Also identifies the two districts Dindori of state Madhya Pradesh and Chitrakoot of Uttar Pradesh having their own mortality pattern and this is true for males as well as for females also. It is found that there is considerable intra district variation in mortality patterns. Results clearly point out that united approach of health policies will not work properly and henceforth will not help in reducing mortality. Thus on the basis of findings study recommends not only for macro level as well as for micro level health policies and program.

In developing countries, individual livelihoods are threatened on a daily basis by exposure to shocks such as inflation, severe weather conditions and unstable markets while options for mitigation are limited. Individuals give resources typically financial to friends and family as a way to self-insure. This paper tests the reciprocity motive for transfer by examining how an individual’s survival expectation influences the amount they give in monetary transfer. To meet this goal, I apply an ordered logit model that utilizes data on respondents’ subjective estimates of the probability of death within a year to determine the likelihood of the size of monetary transfer they give to other family members. The theory of a ‘moral economy’ proposes that in infinitely repeated games an individual who does not expect that they will be around to gain at some point in the exchange interaction will not participate. As such, the expectation is that individuals who expect to die within a year will not transfer money to others. The findings from this study will have implications for the development of public safety nets programs, especially for areas with a high HIV prevalence rate as found in Malawi.

Much of the research in recent times have focused on the changes in diets of people of developed as well as developing nations. This study tries to explain the changing food preferences of people in Indian context using data from a couple of secondary sources, and the health outcome of these changes on adult and young children. Further the study tries to examine the association of feeding practices on nutritional outcome during early childhood considering that these two are not mutually exclusive. We also examine the clustering of some quantitative measures of nutrition and the transmission of height, weight and other health outcomes from parents to children. The results confirm the westernisation of traditional diet in India particularly in urban areas, and its influence on nutritional status distribution of children from more underweight towards coexistence of overweight and underweight. Along with westernisation, differential feeding practices is another determinant of change in health outcome of children, but less improvement have been noticed in percentage of children getting a diverse diet. The results further indicate significant correlation between health status of parents and children and propose that children inherit a prominent fraction of their health status from their parents.