title: Exposure to Neighborhood Foreclosures and Changes in Cardiometabolic Health: Results From MESA.
abstract: Home foreclosures can precipitate declines in health among the individuals who lost their homes. Whether home foreclosures can "spillover" to affect the health of other neighborhood residents is largely unknown. Using longitudinal data from the Multi-Ethnic Study of Atherosclerosis that were linked to foreclosure data from 2005 to 2012, we assessed whether greater exposure to neighborhood foreclosures was associated with temporal changes in 3 objectively measured cardiometabolic risk factors: body mass index, systolic blood pressure, and fasting glucose level. We used fixed-effects models to estimate mean changes in cardiometabolic risk factors associated with changes in neighborhood foreclosures over time. In models in which we controlled for time-varying income, working status, medication use, neighborhood poverty, neighborhood unemployment, and interactions of age, sex, race, and state foreclosure laws with time, a standard-deviation increase in neighborhood foreclosures (1.9 foreclosures per quarter mile) was associated with increases in fasting glucose (mean = 0.22 mg/dL, 95% confidence interval: -0.05, 0.50) and decreases in blood pressure (mean = -0.27 mm Hg, 95% confidence interval: -0.49, -0.04). Changes in neighborhood foreclosure rates were not associated with changes in body mass index. Overall, greater exposure to neighborhood foreclosures had mixed associations with cardiometabolic risk factors over time. Given the millions of mortgages still in default, further research clarifying the potential health effects of neighborhood foreclosures is needed.
authors.forename: Paul J
authors.initials: PJ
authors.lastname: Christine
authors.forename: Kari
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Moore
authors.forename: Natalie D
authors.initials: ND
authors.lastname: Crawford
authors.forename: Tonatiuh
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Barrientos-Gutierrez
authors.forename: Brisa N
authors.initials: BN
authors.lastname: Sánchez
authors.forename: Teresa
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Seeman
authors.forename: Ana V
authors.initials: AV
authors.lastname: Diez Roux
mesh_terms: D000368:Aged; D000369:Aged, 80 and over; D000704:Analysis of Variance; D001786:Blood Glucose; D001794:Blood Pressure; D015992:Body Mass Index; D005260:Female; D006798:Housing / Q000191:economics*; D006801:Humans; D008137:Longitudinal Studies; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D012111:Residence Characteristics; D012307:Risk Factors; D012959:Socioeconomic Factors
chemical_list: D001786:Blood Glucose
keywords: blood glucose; blood pressure; body mass index; foreclosure; neighborhoods; social environment