Citation

Antunes L, Mendonça D, Ribeiro AI, Maringe C, Rachet B. BMC Public Health 2019; 19(1): e276.

Affiliation

Cancer Survival Group, Department of Non-Communicable Disease Epidemiology, Faculty of Epidemiology and Population Health, London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, London, UK.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2019, Holtzbrinck Springer Nature Publishing Group - BMC)

DOI

10.1186/s12889-019-6579-6

PMID

30845935

Abstract

BACKGROUND: Completing mortality data by information on possible socioeconomic inequalities in mortality is crucial for policy planning. The aim of this study was to build deprivation-specific life tables using the Portuguese version of the European Deprivation Index (EDI) as a measure of area-level socioeconomic deprivation, and to evaluate mortality trends between the periods 2000-2002 and 2010-2012.

METHODS: Statistics Portugal provided the counts of deaths and population by sex, age group, calendar year and area of residence (parish). A socioeconomic deprivation level was assigned to each parish according to the quintile of their national EDI distribution. Death counts were modelled within the generalised linear model framework as a function of age, deprivation level and calendar period. Mortality Rate Ratios (MRR) were estimated to evaluate variations in mortality between deprivation groups and periods.

RESULTS: Life expectancy at birth increased from 74.0 and 80.9 years in 2000-2002, for men and women, respectively, and to 77.6 and 83.8 years in 2010-2012. Yet, life expectancy at birth differed by deprivation, with, compared to least deprived population, a deficit of about 2 (men) and 1 (women) years among most deprived in the whole study period. The higher mortality experienced by most deprived groups at birth (in 2010-2012, mortality rate ratios of 1.74 and 1.29 in men and women, respectively) progressively disappeared with increasing age.

CONCLUSIONS: Persistent differences in mortality and life expectancy were observed according to ecological socioeconomic deprivation. These differences were larger among men and mostly marked at birth for both sexes.

Language: en

Keywords

Deprivation; Health inequalities; Life-tables; Multivariable modelling; Socioeconomic factors