Poor self-reported health and sleeping difficulties among Kurdish immigrant men in Sweden.
This study explores the association between ethnicity and poor self-reported health and psychological distress, sleeping difficulties, and use of psychotropic drugs among immigrant Kurdish men and native Swedish men, based on data from the first Swedish National Survey of Immigrants and the Swedish Level-of-Living Surveys collected in 1996 by Statistics Sweden. The age-adjusted odds of poor self-reported health and sleeping difficulties among Kurdish men was about 3.5 times higher than among Swedish men. The odds ratio decreased to 2.1 and 2.7 respectively in a model adjusted for age and the other explanatory variables. Yearning for the home country, perceived discrimination and unemployment in the host country seem to be possible explanations for the higher levels of distress among Kurdish immigrants to Sweden.
Taloyan
Marina
M
Centre for Family and Community Medicine, Karolinska Institute, Huddinge, Sweden. marina.taloyan@sll.se
Johansson
Leena Maria
LM
Johansson
Sven-Erik
SE
Sundquist
Jan
J
Koctürk
Tahire O
TO
D000328:Adult; D001007:Anxiety / Q000453:epidemiology / Q000208:ethnology; D003430:Cross-Sectional Studies; D004522:Educational Status; D004641:Emigration and Immigration; D005006:Ethnicity / Q000523:psychology*; D005191:Family Characteristics / Q000208:ethnology; D006305:Health Status Indicators; D006306:Health Surveys; D006801:Humans; D007492:Iran / Q000208:ethnology; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D012893:Sleep Wake Disorders / Q000453:epidemiology / Q000208:ethnology*; D012959:Socioeconomic Factors; D013548:Sweden; D014421:Turkey / Q000208:ethnology; D014478:Unemployment / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*