|
medpundit |
||
 |
 |
|
Monday, September 13, 2004In a study of white American men (which therefore eliminated the variable of race), when smoking and other risk factors were taken into account, men earning less than $10,000 a year (on the basis of data from the 1980 Census) were 1.5 times as likely to die prematurely as were those earning $34,000 or more. Similar results were obtained in Great Britain, where the Whitehall study of British civil servants showed that when smoking and other risk factors were controlled for, those in the lowest employment category were still more than twice as likely to die prematurely of cardiovascular disease as were those in the highest category. When I think of my practice, it's undeniably true that the poorest are the least healthy. But it's also true that many times the reason they're poor is because they're in poor health. I have some patients who are poor because they have low-paying jobs. Their health is pretty good. But my sickest patients are those on Medicaid who are on Medicaid because they're too sick to hold a job. They have very bad congenital problems (spina bifida, cerebral palsy) or they have had major trauma that caused severe disabilities, or they have severe psychiatric illnesses that make holding a job difficult. It isn't their poverty that makes them ill, it's their illness that makes them poor. I can't say with any certainty whether that holds true for the nation, but it's the way it is in my little corner of the world. posted by Sydney on 9/13/2004 08:00:00 AM 0 comments 0 Comments: |
|
