Investigating the Proximal Determinants of Self-Rated Health in Three African Peri-Urban Communities

Funmilola OlaOlorun, Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health
Assefa Seme, Addis Ababa University
Frederick Makumbi, Makerere University
Denis Yar, Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology

Self-rated health (SRH) has consistently been associated with mortality, disability and morbidity. We investigated proximal determinants of SRH and estimated the predicted probabilities of membership in each category of SRH based on self-report of selected non-communicable diseases. Data were from baseline surveys of married women (15-44y) and men (20-59y) in three (Ethiopia, Ghana and Uganda) of six sites of the Family Health and Wealth Study, an ongoing longitudinal study. We considered three proximal determinants of self-rated health: systolic blood pressure; non-communicable disease; and health problems. Following estimation of ordinal logistic regressions, the presence of one or more health problems was the only proximal determinant that remained significantly associated with SRH in both men and women across the three sites. As these study cohorts are being followed over time, we expect that future findings will more fully inform the influence of proximal determinants on self-rated health.