Physical activity and sedentary behaviour among south Asian immigrants in Australia.

ISSUE ADDRESSED: South Asians make up the second-largest group of immigrants in Australia and experience a higher burden of chronic diseases compared with non-immigrants. Most chronic diseases are associated with insufficient physical activity (PA) and sedentary behaviour (SB); however, studies involving PA and SB in immigrants are limited. This study aimed to explore PA and SB and associated factors among South Asian immigrants in Australia. METHODS: South Asian adult immigrants in Australia were surveyed online (from November 2020 to March 2021) about PA, SB, knowledge and barriers to PA. Logistic regressions were used to examine factors associated with insufficient PA (<150 minutes/week) and a high sitting time (>8 hours/day). RESULTS: A total of 321 participants provided complete data. Approximately 76% of participants reported insufficient PA and 27% reported high sitting time. Only 6% of participants walked or bicycled. The main reported barriers to PA were lack of time, costs, transport facilities, skills, and culturally appropriate resources. Around 52% of participants were not aware of the importance of PA. Participants with self-reported poor health and who used motorized travel were more likely to have inadequate PA. High sitting time was more common among middle-aged, overweight/obese, and middle-income participants. CONCLUSIONS: Most South Asian immigrants are insufficiently active with a lack of socio-economically appropriate PA facilities identified as a major challenge. A stronger collaboration between policymakers and community is required for sustainable solutions. SO WHAT?: Affordable and appropriate PA facilities in neighbourhoods could overcome major barriers. Also, information about PA should incorporate cultural expectations in the general recommendations to encourage participation.

Bullying Experiences of South Asian Immigrants in Australia: a Mixed-Method Study.

Bullying is a pervasive problem faced by immigrants that negatively impacts their health and well-being. Understanding the factors that contribute to bullying and the prevalence of bullying victimisation may help to develop strategies to prevent bullying. Using a mixed-method approach, this study explored the perceptions and prevalence of bullying of South Asian immigrants living in Australia. Five focus group discussions (FGDs) were conducted to explore bullying experiences and to inform an online survey. The online survey included the California Bullying Victimisation Scale-Retrospective (CBVS-R) to measure prevalence, types, and places of bullying victimisation. Data collected from FGDs were thematically analysed while survey data were examined to identify factors associated with bullying. The main contributing factors reported by participants during FGDs were ethnic attire (clothing), religion, accent, workplace achievement, skin colour, and body shape. The online survey collected responses from 313 participants that included females (44%) and males (56%) with a mean age of 41.0 (SD ± 10.3) years. Almost 31% of participants surveyed experienced multiple bullying incidents per month with no differences observed between gender (32% in males, 31% in females). Males were mostly bullied (63%) in their workplaces while females were mostly bullied (56%) at bus or train stations. Country of birth, employment status, educational qualification, and English proficiency significantly associated with bullying experience (p < 0.001). These findings show that bullying affects male and female immigrants in different forms and settings; therefore, a large national assessment is needed to evaluate the magnitude of bullying and its consequences on immigrant health and well-being.

The prevalence of chronic diseases in international immigrants: a systematic review and meta-analysis.

AIMS: The purpose of this study is systematically to review and synthesise available prevalence data of major chronic diseases in international immigrants. METHODS: Four electronic databases were searched to retrieve peer-reviewed original articles published in English between January 2000 and December 2020. Cross-sectional, cohort, or longitudinal studies that reported the prevalence of cardiovascular disease, any type of cancer, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, and type 2 diabetes among immigrant adults were included. We calculated pooled prevalence using random-effects meta-analyses. RESULTS: Of 13,363 articles retrieved, 24 met the eligibility criteria. The pooled prevalence of diabetes was 9.0% (95% confidence interval (CI) 7.6-10.4) with a higher prevalence in North American countries 11.1% (95% CI 8.0-14.1) than in the other destination countries: 6.6% (95% CI 5.1-8.1) including Italy, Sweden, The Netherlands, Australia, and Israel. The pooled prevalence of cardiovascular diseases and respiratory diseases was 7.7% (95% CI 5.7-9.6) and 6.5% (95% CI 2.3-10.7), respectively. Only two articles reported the prevalence of cancers (2.7% and 3.8%). We found high heterogeneity among all studies regardless of the disease. CONCLUSIONS: The prevalence of diabetes was higher than other chronic diseases in international immigrants. There is a strong need to enhance health information systems to understand the magnitude of chronic diseases among different immigrant subgroups.

'Cost, culture and circumstances': Barriers and enablers of health behaviours in South Asian immigrants of Australia.

The health behaviours related to chronic diseases experienced by South Asian immigrants are interrelated with their culture and socioeconomic conditions. South Asian immigrants experience a disproportionate burden of chronic disease compared with non-immigrants Australian-born general population. The primary aim of this study was to gain an in-depth understanding of health behaviours and healthcare access in the South Asian immigrant population of Australia. Five focus group discussions (FGDs) were conducted with South Asian immigrants (n = 29; 18 females) aged 27-50 years in Brisbane, Australia. Separate FGDs were conducted for males and females in the English language. Semi-structured guided questions related to the perception, barriers and facilitators of health behaviours. Data were analysed with Nvivo-12 following a thematic analysis. A conceptual model is proposed to provide a summarised understanding of barriers and facilitators of health behaviours in South Asian immigrants. The major reported constraints for participating in physical activity were cultural beliefs, lack of time, work stress and high fees of fitness activities, while parks and peer modelling were mentioned as a strong motivator for walking, cycling and participating in group sports activities. The cultural and religious connections, cost of cigarettes and drink driving penalties were the most mentioned facilitators for a healthy lifestyle. The important factors related to unhealthy eating habits were the traditional cooking methods, social interactions and the high cost of fruits and vegetables. Community perceptions and language barriers were also acknowledged as the main factors for the decrease in accessing health care services. This study illustrates that cultural beliefs, high cost of healthy food and facilities and social circumstances are mainly linked with the health behaviours and healthcare access in South Asian immigrant's lifestyles.

A Longitudinal Assessment of Risk Factors and Chronic Diseases among Immigrant and Non-Immigrant Adults in Australia.

This study aimed to investigate the prevalence and trajectories of chronic diseases and risk behaviors in immigrants from high-income countries (HIC), low-middle-income countries (LMIC), to Australian-born people. Data were used from five waves of the HABITAT (2007-2016) study-11,035 adults living in Brisbane, Australia. Chronic diseases included cancer, diabetes mellitus, coronary heart disease, and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD). Risk factors assessed were body mass index (BMI), insufficient physical activity, and cigarette smoking. Diabetes mellitus increased in all groups, with the highest increase of 33% in LMIC immigrants. The prevalence of cancers increased 19.6% in the Australian-born, 16.6% in HIC immigrants, and 5.1% in LMIC immigrants. The prevalence of asthma increased in HIC immigrants while decreased in the other two groups. Poisson regression showed that LMIC immigrants had 1.12 times higher rates of insufficient physical activity, 0.75 times lower rates of smoking, and 0.77 times lower rates of being overweight than the Australian-born population. HIC immigrants had 0.96 times lower rates of insufficient physical activity and 0.93 times lower rates of overweight than Australian-born. The findings of this study can inform better strategies to reduce health disparities by targeting high-risk cohorts.

Scattering of Light from the Systemic Circulatory System.

There are many factors of methodological origin that influence the measurement of optical properties of the entire circulatory system which consists of blood as the basic component. The basic idea of this review article is to provide the optical properties of the circulatory system with all those factors of influence that have been employed in biomedical optics for different applications. We begin with the available optical properties, i.e., absorption, scattering and, reduced scattering coefficient, in general for any tissue inside the human body and prominent scattering theories (e.g., light, X-rays, neutrons) that are helpful in this regard. We have reviewed and compiled already available formulas and their respective available data for different human tissues for these optical properties. Then we have descended to the blood composition and to different scattering techniques available in the literature to study scattering and light propagation inside blood. We have reviewed both computational and theoretical scattering techniques.

Primary hypergonadotrophic hypogonadism, alopecia totalis, and müllerian hypoplasia: a clinical study.

Two sisters with primary hypergonadotrophic hypogonadism associated with alopecia totalis, streak ovaries, absent or rudimentary uterus and markedly hypo plastic internal and external genitalia are presented. Their parents were first cousins.