IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/gam/jijerp/v13y2016i2p183-d63399.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Environment and Its Influence on Health and Demographics in South Korea

Author

Listed:
  • Ramiro D. Bravo Santisteban

    (Department of Biomedical Engineering, Kyung Hee University, Gyeonggi-do 17104, Korea)

  • Young L. Kim

    (Weldon School of Biomedical Engineering, Purdue University, West Lafayette, IN 47907, USA
    Department of Computer Science and Engineering, Kyung Hee University, Gyeonggi-do 17104, Korea)

  • Umar Farooq

    (Department of Biomedical Engineering, Kyung Hee University, Gyeonggi-do 17104, Korea)

  • Tae-Seong Kim

    (Department of Biomedical Engineering, Kyung Hee University, Gyeonggi-do 17104, Korea)

  • Sekyoung Youm

    (Department of Industrial and System Engineering, Dongguk University, Seoul 04620, Korea)

  • Seung-Hun Park

    (The HIMS Inc., Gyeonggi-do 16702, Korea)

Abstract

As the prevalence of overweight and obesity has been increasing in South Korea, it is critical to better understand possible associations between environmental surroundings and general health status. We characterize key health test readings and basic demographic information from 10,816 South Koreans, obtained from two Ubiquitous Healthcare (U-Healthcare) centers that have distinct surrounding neighborhood characteristics. One is located in a rural area in Busan, the other is located in an urban area in Daegu surrounded by a highly crowded residential and commercial business area. We analyze comprehensive health data sets, including blood pressure, body mass index, pulse rate, and body fat percentage from December 2013 to December 2014 to study differences in overall health test measurements between users of rural and urban U-Healthcare centers. We conduct multiple regression analyses to evaluate differences in general health status between the two centers, adjusting for confounding factors. We report statistical evidence of differences in blood pressure at the two locations. As local residents are major users, the result indicates that the environmental surroundings of the centers can influence the demographics of the users, the type of health tests in demand, and the users’ health status. We further envision that U-Healthcare centers will provide public users with an opportunity for enhancing their current health, which could potentially be used to prevent them from developing chronic diseases, while providing surveillance healthcare data.

Suggested Citation

  • Ramiro D. Bravo Santisteban & Young L. Kim & Umar Farooq & Tae-Seong Kim & Sekyoung Youm & Seung-Hun Park, 2016. "Environment and Its Influence on Health and Demographics in South Korea," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 13(2), pages 1-10, February.
    • Handle: RePEc:gam:jijerp:v:13:y:2016:i:2:p:183-:d:63399
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/13/2/183/pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/13/2/183/
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Yen, I.H. & Kaplan, G.A., 1998. "Poverty area residence and changes in physical activity level: Evidence from the Alameda County Study," American Journal of Public Health, American Public Health Association, vol. 88(11), pages 1709-1712.
    2. Grafova, I.B. & Freedman, V.A. & Kumar, R. & Rogowski, J., 2008. "Neighborhoods and obesity in later life," American Journal of Public Health, American Public Health Association, vol. 98(11), pages 2065-2071.
    3. Freedman, V.A. & Grafova, I.B. & Rogowski, J., 2011. "Neighborhoods and chronic disease onset in later life," American Journal of Public Health, American Public Health Association, vol. 101(1), pages 79-86.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Steffen Andreas Schüle & Gabriele Bolte, 2015. "Interactive and Independent Associations between the Socioeconomic and Objective Built Environment on the Neighbourhood Level and Individual Health: A Systematic Review of Multilevel Studies," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 10(4), pages 1-31, April.
    2. Won, Jaewoong & Lee, Chanam & Forjuoh, Samuel N. & Ory, Marcia G., 2016. "Neighborhood safety factors associated with older adults' health-related outcomes: A systematic literature review," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 165(C), pages 177-186.
    3. Stafford, Mai & Cummins, Steven & Ellaway, Anne & Sacker, Amanda & Wiggins, Richard D. & Macintyre, Sally, 2007. "Pathways to obesity: Identifying local, modifiable determinants of physical activity and diet," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 65(9), pages 1882-1897, November.
    4. Arline Geronimus & John Bound & Annie Ro, 2014. "Residential Mobility Across Local Areas in the United States and the Geographic Distribution of the Healthy Population," Demography, Springer;Population Association of America (PAA), vol. 51(3), pages 777-809, June.
    5. Ryvicker, Miriam & Gallo, William T. & Fahs, Marianne C., 2012. "Environmental factors associated with primary care access among urban older adults," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 75(5), pages 914-921.
    6. Pengxiang Zhao & Mei-Po Kwan & Suhong Zhou, 2018. "The Uncertain Geographic Context Problem in the Analysis of the Relationships between Obesity and the Built Environment in Guangzhou," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 15(2), pages 1-20, February.
    7. Kolodinsky, Jane M. & Battista, Geoffrey & Roche, Erin & Lee, Brian H.Y. & Johnson, Rachel K., 2017. "Estimating the effect of mobility and food choice on obesity in a rural, northern environment," Journal of Transport Geography, Elsevier, vol. 61(C), pages 30-39.
    8. Hee-Jung Jun & Mi Namgung, 2018. "Gender Difference and Spatial Heterogeneity in Local Obesity," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 15(2), pages 1-17, February.
    9. Wen, Ming & Maloney, Thomas N., 2014. "Neighborhood socioeconomic status and BMI differences by immigrant and legal status: Evidence from Utah," Economics & Human Biology, Elsevier, vol. 12(C), pages 120-131.
    10. Shalini A Tendulkar & Karestan C Koenen & Erin C Dunn & Stephen Buka & S V Subramanian, 2012. "Neighborhood Influences on Perceived Social Support Among Parents: Findings from the Project on Human Development in Chicago Neighborhoods," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 7(4), pages 1-9, April.
    11. Das, Jayoti & De Loach, Stephen B., 2011. "Mirror, mirror on the wall: The effect of time spent grooming on earnings," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 40(1), pages 26-34, February.
    12. Georgia S. Papoutsi & Andreas C. Drichoutis & Rodolfo M. Nayga Jr., 2013. "The Causes Of Childhood Obesity: A Survey," Journal of Economic Surveys, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 27(4), pages 743-767, September.
    13. DUJARDIN, Claire & lorant, VINCENT & THOMAS, Isabelle, 2013. "Self-assessed health of elderly people in Brussels: does the built environment matter?," LIDAM Discussion Papers CORE 2013048, Université catholique de Louvain, Center for Operations Research and Econometrics (CORE).
    14. Stankov, Ivana & Useche, Andres Felipe & Meisel, Jose D. & Montes, Felipe & Morais, Lidia MO. & Friche, Amelia AL. & Langellier, Brent A. & Hovmand, Peter & Sarmiento, Olga Lucia & Hammond, Ross A. & , 2021. "From causal loop diagrams to future scenarios: Using the cross-impact balance method to augment understanding of urban health in Latin America," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 282(C).
    15. Grafova, Irina B. & Freedman, Vicki A. & Lurie, Nicole & Kumar, Rizie & Rogowski, Jeannette, 2014. "The difference-in-difference method: Assessing the selection bias in the effects of neighborhood environment on health," Economics & Human Biology, Elsevier, vol. 13(C), pages 20-33.
    16. Lisa A. Matricciani & Catherine Paquet & Natasha J. Howard & Robert Adams & Neil T. Coffee & Anne W. Taylor & Mark Daniel, 2013. "Investigating Individual- and Area-Level Socioeconomic Gradients of Pulse Pressure among Normotensive and Hypertensive Participants," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 10(2), pages 1-19, February.
    17. Engel, L. & Chudyk, A.M. & Ashe, M.C. & McKay, H.A. & Whitehurst, D.G.T. & Bryan, S., 2016. "Older adults' quality of life – Exploring the role of the built environment and social cohesion in community-dwelling seniors on low income," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 164(C), pages 1-11.
    18. Michael, Yvonne L. & Nagel, Corey L. & Gold, Rachel & Hillier, Teresa A., 2014. "Does change in the neighborhood environment prevent obesity in older women?," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 102(C), pages 129-137.
    19. Pascual, Cruz & Regidor, Enrique & Astasio, Paloma & Ortega, Paloma & Navarro, Pedro & Domínguez, Vicente, 2007. "The association of current and sustained area-based adverse socioeconomic environment with physical inactivity," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 65(3), pages 454-466, August.
    20. Laraia, Barbara A. & Karter, Andrew J. & Warton, E. Margaret & Schillinger, Dean & Moffet, Howard H. & Adler, Nancy, 2012. "Place matters: Neighborhood deprivation and cardiometabolic risk factors in the Diabetes Study of Northern California (DISTANCE)," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 74(7), pages 1082-1090.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:gam:jijerp:v:13:y:2016:i:2:p:183-:d:63399. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: MDPI Indexing Manager (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.mdpi.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.