Dombrowski Julia C, Thomas James C, Kaufman Jay S
Public Health Leadership Program, University of North Carolina School of Public Health, Chapel Hill, North Carolina, USA.
Sex Transm Dis. 2004 Mar;31(3):149-53. doi: 10.1097/01.olq.0000114656.57682.f4.
Although relative measures are commonly used to express health disparities, absolute measures could have more value in public health decision-making.
The goal of this study was to examine how associations between county-level variables and black-white racial disparity in gonorrhea rates varied by the measure of disparity used.
We studied correlations of 10 population-level variables with the incidence rate difference (RD) and incidence rate ratio (RR) of gonorrhea in North Carolina (NC) counties.
Nine of the 10 variables correlated more strongly with the RD than the RR. The RD was highly correlated with incidence rates of gonorrhea among blacks (r >0.99).
Several county-level variables were correlated with absolute, but not with relative, racial disparity in gonorrhea in NC. Disease rates were so disparate that the RD essentially reflected rates in the black population. The RD should be preferentially used in planning and evaluating interventions aimed at eliminating racial disparities in gonorrhea in NC.
尽管相对指标通常用于表达健康差异，但绝对指标在公共卫生决策中可能具有更大价值。
本研究的目的是探讨县级变量与淋病发病率的黑白种族差异之间的关联如何因所使用的差异衡量指标而异。
我们研究了北卡罗来纳州（NC）各县10个人口水平变量与淋病发病率差异（RD）和发病率比（RR）之间的相关性。
10个变量中的9个与RD的相关性比与RR的相关性更强。RD与黑人淋病发病率高度相关（r>0.99）。
NC州几个县级变量与淋病的绝对种族差异相关，但与相对种族差异无关。疾病发病率差异如此之大，以至于RD基本上反映了黑人人群的发病率。在规划和评估旨在消除NC州淋病种族差异的干预措施时，应优先使用RD。
