Gender patterns of socioeconomic differences in premature mortality: follow-up of the Hungarian Epidemiological Panel.

Background: Gender differences in premature mortality rates and in the size of socioeconomic inequalities in mortality vary across countries.

Purpose: We aimed to quantify the gender differences in the association between socioeconomic status (SES) and premature all-cause mortality and to analyse whether psychosocial factors might associate between SES and mortality among men and women separately in the middle-aged Hungarian population.

Method: Men (n = 1130) and women (n = 1529), aged 40-69 years, participants in the Hungarian Epidemiological Panel (2002) were followed up for 3.

[Why do Hungarian men die early?].

The mortality rate for 40- 69-year-old men was 12.2/thousand males of corresponding age in 1960 and 16.2 in 2005: it increased by 33%, while among 40- 69-year-old women it decreased from 9.

Work stress and mental health in a changing society.

Background: The aim of this representative study in the Hungarian population was to analyse the association between work-related factors and self-reported mental and physical health after controlling for negative affect and hostility as personality traits.

Methods: The effects of job related factors on Beck Depression Score, WHO well-being score and self-rated health (SRH) were analysed in a representative sample of 3153 male and 2710 female economically active Hungarians.

Results: In both genders negative affect was the most important correlate of depression, well-being and SRH, whereas hostility was closely associated only with depression.

Chronic stress and social changes: socioeconomic determination of chronic stress.

In the last decades in the transforming societies of Central and Eastern Europe, premature mortality increased dramatically, especially among men. Increasing disparities in socioeconomic conditions have been accompanied by a widening socioeconomic gradient in mortality among men. Social cohesion and meaning in life may help to counterbalance the widening gap in material circumstances.

Psychosocial determinants of premature cardiovascular mortality differences within Hungary.

Objectives: The life expectancy gap between Central-Eastern European (CEE) countries, including Hungary, and Western Europe (WE) is mainly attributable to excess cardiovascular (CV) mortality in midlife. This study explores the contribution of socioeconomic, work related, psychosocial, and behavioural variables to explaining variations of middle aged male and female CV mortality across 150 sub-regions in Hungary.

Design: Cross sectional, ecological analyses.

Low socioeconomic status of the opposite sex is a risk factor for middle aged mortality.

Objectives: To examine the relations between subjective social status, and objective socioeconomic status (as measured by income and education) in relation to male/female middle aged mortality rates across 150 sub-regions in Hungary.

Design: Cross sectional, ecological analyses.

Setting: 150 sub-regions of Hungary.

Life meaning: an important correlate of health in the Hungarian population.

One of the 5 coping scales in Rahe's Brief Stress and Coping Inventory, entitled Life Meaning, was examined in relation to demographic characteristics, other coping measures, and health status in a sample of 12,640 Hungarian participants. Participants were selected to represent the country's population according to sex, age, and place of residence. The study also explored the contribution of life meaning to the explanation of variations of middle-aged (45-64 years) male and female mortality rates across 150 subregions in Hungary.

Self-rated health, subjective social status, and middle-aged mortality in a changing society.

In this study, the authors examined the relationships between self-rated health and subjective and objective socioeconomic status (as measured by income and education) in relation to middle-aged mortality differences in men and women across 20 counties in Hungary through a cross-sectional, ecological study. The authors interviewed 12,643 people in a Hungarostudy 2002 survey, profiling the Hungarian population according to gender, age, and county. They found that mean self-rated health and self-rated disability at the county level were significantly associated with middle-aged mortality differences among counties, with male mortality more closely associated with self-rated health.