Comparing the Predictive Power of Self-Rated Health for Mortality in the United States and Canada

• In Event: 480 - Section on Medical Sociology Refereed Roundtable Session and Business Meeting
  In Refereed Roundtable 60min: Table 05. Health in Comparative Perspective

Abstract

This study investigates differences in the predictive power of self-rated health for mortality between the United States and Canada using nationally representative longitudinal health data from each country. We discuss the social conditions that produce variations in the predictive power of self-rated health, and expect to observe substantively similar associations in both countries, but with larger effect sizes in Canada due to advantages in these social conditions. We observe that Canadians report better health than Americans throughout longitudinal observation, both among respondents who died, and a control group of matched survivors. Our analysis finds that in Canada, as in the U.S., reporting “poor” self-rated health is a significant predictor for mortality up to 12 years prior to death, and the predictive power increases with proximity to death. The relatively fewer deaths in the Canadian case-control sample reduced the precision of effect estimates, such that a model hypothesis comparison test did not permit us to infer statistically significant differences between Canadian and American effects, where differences were expected. We discuss these differences and similarities in the context of American and Canadian socio-structural conditions and institutional environments, and propose directions for future research.

Authors

• James Falconer, McGill University

• Amelie Quesnel-Vallee, McGill University