TY - JOUR
T1 - Hearing impairment among adult foreignborn and Swedish-born individuals
T2 - A national Swedish study
AU - Wändell, Per
AU - Li, Xinjun
AU - Carlsson, Axel
AU - Sundquist, Jan
AU - Sundquist, Kristina
N1 - Publisher Copyright:
© 2022 Wändell et al. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.
PY - 2022/8
Y1 - 2022/8
N2 - Objectives To analyze the risk of hearing impairment in adult first-generation immigrants, i.e., foreignborn individuals as compared to Swedish-born individuals. Study design A register-based study follow-up study. Methods A nationwide study of individuals 25 years of age and older (N = 5 464 245; 2 627 364 men and 2 836 881 women) in Sweden. Hearing impairment was defined as at least one registered diagnosis in the National Patient Register between January 1st, 1998 and December 31st, 2015. Cox regression analysis was used to estimate the relative risk (hazard ratios (HR) with 95% confidence intervals (CI)) of incident hearing impairment in foreign-born compared to Swedish-born individuals. Cox regression models were stratified by sex and adjusted for age, comorbidities, and socioeconomic status. Results A total of 244 171 cases (124 349 men and 119 822 women) of hearing impairment were registered. Hearing impairment risk expressed as fully adjusted HRs (99% CI) was somewhat lower among immigrant men 0.95 (0.92-97) but not among immigrant women 0.97 (0.95-1.00), with significantly higher fully adjusted HRs among men and women from Asia, and Eastern Europe, and women from Africa. Conclusions We observed a somewhat lower risk of hearing impairment among foreign-born men, but there was a higher risk among men and women from some regions.
AB - Objectives To analyze the risk of hearing impairment in adult first-generation immigrants, i.e., foreignborn individuals as compared to Swedish-born individuals. Study design A register-based study follow-up study. Methods A nationwide study of individuals 25 years of age and older (N = 5 464 245; 2 627 364 men and 2 836 881 women) in Sweden. Hearing impairment was defined as at least one registered diagnosis in the National Patient Register between January 1st, 1998 and December 31st, 2015. Cox regression analysis was used to estimate the relative risk (hazard ratios (HR) with 95% confidence intervals (CI)) of incident hearing impairment in foreign-born compared to Swedish-born individuals. Cox regression models were stratified by sex and adjusted for age, comorbidities, and socioeconomic status. Results A total of 244 171 cases (124 349 men and 119 822 women) of hearing impairment were registered. Hearing impairment risk expressed as fully adjusted HRs (99% CI) was somewhat lower among immigrant men 0.95 (0.92-97) but not among immigrant women 0.97 (0.95-1.00), with significantly higher fully adjusted HRs among men and women from Asia, and Eastern Europe, and women from Africa. Conclusions We observed a somewhat lower risk of hearing impairment among foreign-born men, but there was a higher risk among men and women from some regions.
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85136974127&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1371/journal.pone.0273406
DO - 10.1371/journal.pone.0273406
M3 - Article
C2 - 36001613
AN - SCOPUS:85136974127
SN - 1932-6203
VL - 17
JO - PLoS ONE
JF - PLoS ONE
IS - 8 August
M1 - e0273406
ER -