Beatson-Hird P, Yuen P, Balarajan R
Epidemiology and Public Health Research Unit, University of Surrey, Guildford, UK.
J Epidemiol Community Health. 1989 Dec;43(4):385-90. doi: 10.1136/jech.43.4.385.
The aim of the study was to investigate differences in reported health and health service use in single mothers.
The study was a survey of data derived from the General Household Surveys conducted by the Office of Population Censuses and Surveys (OPCS).
The OPCS data are derived from samples of households throughout Great Britain.
OPCS data for 1983 and 1984 were used, comprising approximately 60,000 individuals, of whom 793 were single mothers.
Five different health outcomes were examined, two on perceived morbidity and three on the use of health services. The chief determinants of health and health services use among single mothers were housing tenure, employment status and the age of the youngest child. Single mother status did not consistently contribute to self reported morbidity and uptake of care when adjusted for other social variables, but there was a difference between categories of single mother, with those who were separated/divorced and those who were widowed reporting more acute illness than those who were married.
The findings suggest that single mothers do not form a homogeneous group and that, if special consideration is to be given to them when planning and allocating health service resources, this needs to be taken into account in the context of other socioeconomic factors.
本研究旨在调查单身母亲在报告的健康状况和医疗服务使用方面的差异。
本研究是对人口普查与调查办公室（OPCS）进行的一般家庭调查所得数据的一项调查。
OPCS数据源自整个英国的家庭样本。
使用了1983年和1984年的OPCS数据，包括约60,000人，其中793人为单身母亲。
检查了五种不同的健康结果，两种关于感知到的发病率，三种关于医疗服务的使用。单身母亲健康状况和医疗服务使用的主要决定因素是住房保有形式、就业状况和最小孩子的年龄。在对其他社会变量进行调整后，单身母亲身份并不始终导致自我报告的发病率和护理利用率出现差异，但不同类别的单身母亲之间存在差异，分居/离婚的单身母亲和丧偶的单身母亲报告的急性疾病比已婚的单身母亲更多。
研究结果表明，单身母亲并非一个同质化群体，并且，如果在规划和分配医疗服务资源时要给予她们特殊考虑，这需要在其他社会经济因素的背景下加以考虑。
