Individual and Neighborhood Socioeconomic Status and Inflammation in Mexican American Women

Abstract

Objective Inflammation may represent a biological mechanism underlying associations of socioeconomic status (SES) with cardiovascular disease (CVD). The current study examined relationships of individual and neighborhood SES with inflammatory markers in Mexican-American women and evaluated contributions of obesity and related heath behaviors to these associations. Methods A random sample of 284 Mexican-American women (mean age 49.74 years) was recruited from socioeconomically diverse South San Diego communities. Women completed measures of sociodemographic characteristics and health behaviors, and a physical examination with fasting blood draw for assay of plasma C-reactive-protein (CRP), interleukin-6 (IL-6), and soluble intercellular adhesion molecule-1 (sICAM-1). Neighborhood SES was extracted from the US Census Bureau 2000 database. Results In multilevel models, a one-standard deviation (SD) higher individual and neighborhood SES related to a 27.35% and 23.56% lower CRP (ps < .01), a 7.04% and 5.32% lower sICAM-1 (ps < .05), and a 10.46% (p < .05) and 2.40% lower IL-6 level (NS), respectively. Controlling for individual SES, a one-SD higher neighborhood SES related to a 18.05% lower CRP (p = .07); there was no unique effect of neighborhood SES for IL-6 or sICAM-1. Differences in body mass index, waist circumference, and dietary fat consumption contributed significantly to SES-inflammation associations. Conclusions The findings support a link between SES and inflammatory markers in Mexican-American women, and implicate obesity and dietary fat in these associations. Additional effects of neighborhood SES were not statistically significant. These findings should be viewed tentatively because the relatively small sample size limits the evaluation of multiple contextual factors.

Multilevel examination of the association of urbanization with inflammation in Chinese adults

“…Unlike a number of previous studies documenting significant inverse associations between CRP and individual and community income and education level (Gallo et al, 2012; Nazmi and Victora, 2007; Petersen et al, 2008; Pollitt et al, 2007), we found that community-level education, income, and housing quality were all associated with greater odds of moderate inflammation in younger Chinese men and Chinese women over 40. Further, we found no ameliorating effects of community-level health or social service availability on individual-level risk of inflammation, despite previous hypotheses that access to these services may underlie the inverse relationship between state- and census tract-level income and CRP levels (Clark et al, 2012; Holmes and Marcelli, 2012).…”

“…A number of components previously linked to inflammation in urbanization and neighborhood health research, including sanitation (McDade et al, 2008; Williams and McDade, 2009), income diversity (Gallo et al, 2012; Nazmi and Victora, 2007; Petersen et al, 2008), and education (Nazmi and Victora, 2007) were attenuated in the women in our study when we controlled for individual-level sociodemographic and obesogenic risk factors. Further controlling for pathogen burden had no additional attenuating effect.…”

“…Unlike much previous work on neighborhoods and health that has used aggregated individual-level data, such as average household income, as a proxy for social and physical environmental characteristics (Gallo et al, 2012; Holmes and Marcelli, 2012; Petersen et al, 2008), we examined these social and physical characteristics of communities directly. We hypothesized that three main pathways –obesogenic, pathogenic, and psychosocial stress—would link the social and physical environments captured in our urbanization components to the process of inflammation in Chinese adults.…”

“…C-reactive protein (CRP), a commonly measured inflammatory marker, responds to the pathogen exposures (Kushner et al, 2006; McDade et al, 2008), adiposity (Kushner et al, 2006; McDade et al, 2008) and psychosocial stress (Browning et al, 2012; Hansel et al, 2010) that characterize neighborhoods and accompany urbanization. Adult CRP levels are significantly associated with individual and neighborhood socioeconomic status (Gallo et al, 2012; Holmes and Marcelli, 2012; Petersen et al, 2008; Pollitt et al, 2007), neighborhood deprivation, safety, and cohesion (Browning et al, 2012; Nazmi et al, 2010a) and housing conditions (Cagney and Cornwell, 2010; Williams and McDade, 2009). However, much of this research on neighborhood characteristics and inflammation has focused on the United States and other Western countries.…”

Distress, circadian rhythms, immunity, and survival in presurgical breast cancer patients.

“…Additionally, elevated levels of CRP were observed in children living in areas with high poverty or crime (Broyles et al, 2012). The relationship between elevated CRP and low neighborhood SES was also detected in a sample of Mexican-American women (Gallo et al, 2012).…”