Contributions of Social Context to Blood Pressure: Findings From a Multilevel Analysis of Social Capital and Systolic Blood Pressure

Background In recent years, few studies have quantified the effect of residential context on blood pressure. Although these studies have emphasized the importance of socioeconomic influences such as education or poverty levels, the association between the features of social structure such as social...

Full description

Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Published in:American journal of hypertension 2011-06, Vol.24 (6), p.643-646
Main Authors: Hamano, Tsuyoshi, Fujisawa, Yoshikazu, Yamasaki, Masayuki, Ito, Katsuhisa, Nabika, Toru, Shiwaku, Kuninori
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Aged
Arterial hypertension. Arterial hypotension
Biological and medical sciences
Blood and lymphatic vessels
Blood Pressure
Body Mass Index
Cardiology. Vascular system
Clinical manifestations. Epidemiology. Investigative techniques. Etiology
Cross-Sectional Studies
Educational Status
Female
Humans
Hypertension - epidemiology
Japan - epidemiology
Male
Medical sciences
Multilevel Analysis
Residence Characteristics
Social Class
Social Environment
Socioeconomic Factors
Surveys and Questionnaires
Trust
Citations: Items that this one cites
Items that cite this one
Online Access:Get full text
Tags: Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
Description
Summary:Background In recent years, few studies have quantified the effect of residential context on blood pressure. Although these studies have emphasized the importance of socioeconomic influences such as education or poverty levels, the association between the features of social structure such as social capital and blood pressure remain unclear. Therefore, we investigated whether social capital was associated with systolic blood pressure after controlling for individual potential confounders. Methods We analyzed data from the Shimane Study conducted from 2006 to 2008 in rural mountainous regions of Japan. After excluding the missing data and data of participants taking hypertension medication, we conducted a multilevel analysis of the data for 335 individuals nested within 30 postcode sectors. Results Systolic blood pressure increased with increasing age and body mass index. We also found that a higher systolic blood pressure was observed among smokers and those taking medication for diabetes. Regarding the contextual effects of social capital, systolic blood pressure increased with an increasing proportion of lack of fairness, after adjustment for individual confounders. Conclusions To the best of our knowledge, this study is the first to investigate the association between social capital and systolic blood pressure by using a multilevel methodological framework. Surprisingly, we found that lack of fairness had a strong effect on systolic blood pressure. However, we could not find any significant associations between other items of social capital and systolic blood pressure. Further studies are needed to clarify the mechanism by which lack of fairness may have an effect on systolic blood pressure. American Journal of Hypertension, advance online publication 17 March 2011; doi:10.1038/ajh.2011.37
ISSN:0895-7061
1879-1905
1941-7225
DOI:10.1038/ajh.2011.37