Geographical and household variation in health-related quality of life in Hong Kong

Abstract

Objective: This study investigated individual, household, and area effects in the distribution of mental and physical health scores in Hong Kong.

Method: Analysis of data from a large representative survey of randomly sampled 29,561 Chinese adults in 2002. Multilevel regression methods were used to model variance in the physical and mental component of the SF-12 at the individual, household and area levels.

Results: Little variance in scores occurred at the area level (0.3% for physical health and 2.1% for mental health), whereas substantial variance occurred at the household level (23.2% for physical health and 37.2% for mental health), and individual level (76.5% for physical health and 60.7% for mental health).

Conclusions: Similar to studies conducted in Western countries, these results confirm the importance of individual-, household- and area-level characteristics as important determinants of both mental and physical health. It suggests that area-level characteristics may be more important for mental than physical health.