Hypertension prevalence, awareness, treatment, and control in Surinamese living in Suriname and The Netherlands: the HELISUR and HELIUS studies.

We studied hypertension prevalence, awareness, treatment, and control among persons living in a middle-income country compared with those of similar ethnicity living in a high-income country. Data from the cross-sectional HELISUR and HELIUS studies were used among 1000 Surinamese and 6971 Surinamese migrants living in The Netherlands (18-70 years), respectively. Groups were formed based on country and self-defined ethnicity, and stratified by sex. Age-adjusted odds ratios (OR) with 95% confidence intervals (CI) were calculated for hypertension prevalence, awareness, treatment, and control. Subsequently, we focused on hypertension prevalence and adjusted for risk factors for hypertension: BMI and waist circumference (model 2), educational level, physical activity, and smoking (model 3). After adjustment for age, no significant differences in hypertension prevalence, awareness, treatment, and control between countries were seen in men. However, women in Suriname were more often hypertensive with lower levels of awareness and control than those in The Netherlands (African: OR 1.54 [95% CI 1.19, 2.00]; South-Asian: 1.90 [1.35, 2.67]; awareness: 0.62 [0.43, 0.88] in African women; control: 0.48 [0.28, 0.84] in South-Asian women). Higher hypertension prevalence was explained by differences in BMI and waist circumference in African women (adjusted OR 1.26 [0.96, 1.65]) and by education, physical activity, and smoking in South-Asian women (adjusted OR 1.29 [0.87, 1.89]). Particularly, women in Suriname bear a relatively high hypertension burden with lower levels of awareness and control. As the higher hypertension prevalence was mainly explained by lifestyle-related risk factors, health promotion interventions may reduce the hypertension burden in Suriname.

The association between road traffic noise and depressed mood among different ethnic and socioeconomic groups. The HELIUS study.

BACKGROUND: Although there is growing evidence that depressed mood is affected by road traffic noise, previous results are not fully consistent. Furthermore, to our knowledge, no previous research has assessed ethnic and socioeconomic inequalities in the association of noise exposure with depressed mood. OBJECTIVE: To investigate the association between road traffic noise with depressed mood and to determine to what extent this association varies between ethnic and socioeconomic groups. METHOD: We investigated cross-sectional data collected between 2011 and 2015 from 23,293 HELIUS participants (18-70 years) living in Amsterdam. Our study included five different ethnic groups (Dutch, Moroccan, Turkish, South-Asian Surinamese and African Surinamese origin). All respondents were linked by their residential postal code to geographic data on road traffic noise levels (24 h noise average in A-weighted decibels [dB(A)]). Noise was categorized into five categories (45-54 dB(A), 55-59 dB(A), 60-64 dB(A), 65-69 dB(A), ≥70 dB(A)) and high noise exposure was defined as noise levels ≥65 dB(A). Depressed mood was defined as a sum-score of ≥10 on the 9-item Patient Health Questionnaire (PHQ-9). Logistic regression was performed to assess the relationship between road traffic noise and depressed mood. Multilevel analyses were used to take into account the clustering of observations within neighbourhoods. Lastly, logistic regression analyses were applied to estimate relative risks for depressed mood per different ethnic and socioeconomic groups exposed to high noise exposure ≥65 dB(A) compared to <65 dB(A). Analyses were adjusted for individual- and neighbourhood-level confounders. RESULTS: Exposure to ≥70 dB(A) compared to the reference group of 45-54 dB(A) showed a significant positive association with depressed mood (OR: 1.65, 95% CI 1.10, 2.48). Participants exposed to 60-64 dB(A) showed a significantly lower odds ratio of 0.82 (95% CI 0.70, 0.97) compared to the reference group. We observed no differences between ethnic groups in the association of high noise exposure ≥65 dB(A) with depressed mood. Regarding socioeconomic groups, results were different for the medium-low educated group and unemployed group only. CONCLUSION: This study adds new evidence regarding a positive association between high road traffic noise exposure and depressed mood in residential settings. We found no evidence for systematic ethnic or socioeconomic inequalities regarding this association.