Geospatial Analytics, eResearch Knowledge Centre, Human Sciences Research Council, Pretoria 0001, South Africa.
Human Sciences Research Council, Pretoria 0001, South Africa.
Int J Environ Res Public Health. 2023 Feb 26;20(5):4174. doi: 10.3390/ijerph20054174.
Self-perceived health (SPH) is a widely used measure of health amongst individuals that indicates an individual's overall subjective perception of their physical or mental health status. As rural to urban migration increases, the health of individuals within informal settlements becomes an increasing concern as these people are at high health and safety risk due to poor housing structures, overcrowding, poor sanitation and lack of services. This paper aimed to explore factors related to deteriorated SPH status among informal settlement dwellers in South Africa. This study used data from the first national representative Informal Settlements Survey in South Africa conducted by the Human Sciences Research Council (HSRC) in 2015. Stratified random sampling was applied to select informal settlements and households to participate in the study. Multivariate logistic regression and multinomial logistic regression analyses were performed to assess factors affecting deteriorated SPH among the informal settlement dwellers in South Africa. Informal settlement dwellers aged 30 to 39 years old (OR = 0.332 95%CI [0.131-0.840], < 0.05), those with ZAR 5501 and more household income per month (OR = 0.365 95%CI [0.144-0.922], < 0.05) and those who reported using drugs (OR = 0.069 95%CI [0.020-0.240], < 0.001) were significantly less likely to believe that their SPH status had deteriorated compared to the year preceding the survey than their counterparts. Those who reported always running out of food (OR = 3.120 95%CI [1.258-7.737], < 0.05) and those who reported having suffered from illness or injury in the past month preceding the survey (OR = 3.645 95%CI [2.147-6.186], < 0.001) were significantly more likely to believe that their SPH status had deteriorated compared to the year preceding the survey than their counterparts. In addition, those who were employed were significantly (OR = 1.830 95%CI [1.001-3.347], = 0.05) more likely to believe that their SPH status had deteriorated compared to the year preceding the survey than those who were unemployed with neutral SPH as a base category. Overall, the results from this study point to the importance of age, employment, income, lack of food, drug use and injury or illness as key determinants of SPH amongst informal settlement dwellers in South Africa. Given the rapid increasing number of informal settlements in the country, our findings do have implications for better understanding the drivers of deteriorating health in informal settlements. It is therefore recommended that these key factors be incorporated into future planning and policy development aimed at improving the standard of living and health of these vulnerable residents.
自我感知健康（SPH）是个人健康的常用衡量标准，它反映了个体对自身身体或心理健康状况的总体主观认知。随着农村向城市的迁移增加，非正式住区居民的健康成为一个日益令人关注的问题，因为这些人由于住房结构差、过度拥挤、卫生条件差和缺乏服务等原因，处于较高的健康和安全风险之中。本文旨在探讨南非非正式住区居民 SP 健康状况恶化的相关因素。本研究使用了人类科学研究理事会（HSRC）于 2015 年进行的南非首次全国代表性非正式住区调查的数据。采用分层随机抽样选择非正式住区和家庭参与研究。对影响南非非正式住区居民 SP 健康状况恶化的因素进行了多变量逻辑回归和多项逻辑回归分析。30 至 39 岁的非正式住区居民（OR = 0.332 95%CI [0.131-0.840]， < 0.05）、每月家庭收入为 5501 南非兰特及以上（OR = 0.365 95%CI [0.144-0.922]， < 0.05）和报告使用药物的居民（OR = 0.069 95%CI [0.020-0.240]， < 0.001）与调查前一年相比，他们认为自己的 SPH 状况恶化的可能性明显较小。那些总是报告食物短缺的居民（OR = 3.120 95%CI [1.258-7.737]， < 0.05）和那些报告在前一个月生病或受伤的居民（OR = 3.645 95%CI [2.147-6.186]， < 0.001）与调查前一年相比，他们认为自己的 SPH 状况恶化的可能性明显更大。此外，与失业者相比，就业者（OR = 1.830 95%CI [1.001-3.347]， = 0.05）更有可能认为自己的 SPH 状况恶化，而中性 SPH 作为失业者的基准类别。总的来说，这项研究的结果表明，年龄、就业、收入、食物短缺、药物使用以及受伤或患病等因素是南非非正式住区居民 SPH 的关键决定因素。鉴于该国非正式住区数量的快速增加，我们的研究结果对更好地了解非正式住区健康状况恶化的驱动因素具有重要意义。因此，建议将这些关键因素纳入未来旨在改善这些弱势居民生活水平和健康的规划和政策制定中。
