ArticleGlobal health action2015
Women's relative immunity to the socio-economic health gradient: artifact or real?
Article in Global health action, 2015. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 20 papers, 3 of them syntheses that pooled it.
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Who cites it
20 citing papers in PubMed, 3 syntheses or guidelines pooled it, 36 citations in OpenAlex.
- Ethnic Differences in Survival Among Lung Cancer Patients: A Systematic Review.JNCI cancer spectrum · 2021Pooled it
- Socioeconomic status and prevalence of type 2 diabetes in mainland China, Hong Kong and Taiwan: a systematic review.Journal of global health · 2017Pooled it
- Doubly blind: a systematic review of gender in randomised controlled trials.Global health action · 2016Pooled it
- Area-level socioeconomic inequalities in hypertension care cascade in China: a nationwide population-based study based on the ChinaHEART project.The Lancet regional health. Western Pacific · 2025Article
- Current Situations and Challenges in the Development of Health Information Literacy.International journal of environmental research and public health · 2023Review
- Article
- Area Deprivation Index as a Surrogate of Resilience in Aging and Dementia.Frontiers in psychology · 2022Review
- Associations of Neighborhood Socioeconomic Disadvantage With Chronic Conditions by Age, Sex, Race, and Ethnicity in a Population-Based Cohort.Mayo Clinic proceedings · 2022Article
- Welfare state decommodification and population health.PloS one · 2022Article
- Socioeconomic Inequalities in Metabolic Syndrome by Age and Gender in a Spanish Working Population.International journal of environmental research and public health · 2021Article
- The Effect of Socio-Economic Status on Health Information Literacy among Urban Older Adults: Evidence from Western China.International journal of environmental research and public health · 2021Article
- Physical and psychosocial work factors as explanations for social inequalities in self-rated health.International archives of occupational and environmental health · 2021Article
- Review
- Inequalities and Deteriorations in Cardiovascular Health in Premenopausal US Women, 1990-2016.American journal of public health · 2020Article
- Socio-Demographic Determinants of Mortality from Chronic Noncommunicable Diseases in Women of Reproductive Age in the Republic of Georgia: Evidence from the National Reproductive Age Mortality Study (2014).International journal of women's health · 2020Article
- Changing educational gradient in long-term care-free life expectancy among German men, 1997-2012.PloS one · 2019Article
- Article
- Neighbourhood deprivation and lung cancer risk: a nested case-control study in the USA.BMJ open · 2018Article
- Does work-personal life interference predict turnover among male and female managers, and do depressive symptoms mediate the association? A longitudinal study based on a Swedish cohort.BMC public health · 2018Article
- Adolescent reserve capacity, socioeconomic status and school achievement as predictors of mortality in Finland - a longitudinal study.BMC public health · 2017Article
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
2 authors at 2 institutions in 2 countries.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
backgroundIndividual and area socio-economic status (SES) are significant predictors of morbidity and mortality in developed and developing countries. However, the span in health from poorest to richest, that is, the socio-economic gradient, appears steeper for men than women.
objectiveOur aim is to understand women's apparent immunity to the health harms of the SES gradient.
designFindings from a non-systematic search of Medline for population-based, SES gradient studies reporting results for both men and women and with health outcomes of morbidity, mortality or self-rated health (SRH) were reflectively analyzed.
resultsThe 36 papers reviewed generally showed women to be relatively immune to the SES gradient for all but cardiovascular health outcomes. However, addressing the interconnected nature of socio-economic circumstances, exploring whether some measures of SES had ambiguous meanings for either women or men, including modifiers of SES such as household circumstances, social capital or area gender equity, or using indicators of area SES that were contextual rather than aggregates of individual, compositional measures increased the SES gradient for women. Outcome measures that combined mental and physical health, accounted for gender differences in SRH and adjusted for sex-specific differences in causes of mortality also explained some of the observed amelioration of the SES gradient among women.
conclusionsSocio-economic circumstances have a real and sustained impact on individual health. The SES gradient appears stronger for men than for women for all health outcomes other than heart disease. However, some of the observed variability between men and women may be an artifact of biased methodology. Considering webs of causation rather than individual markers of SES along with other sources of gender bias can explain much of women's blunted socio-economic gradient and deepen understanding of the pathways from SES to morbidity and mortality overall.
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