Associations of chronic conditions, APOE4 allele, stress factors, and health behaviors with self-rated health

BMC Geriatrics

Table 1 Proportion of poor self-reported health by study factors

Variable	Code	N	Poor SRH%	p
Overall	--	1,005	26.97
Number of chronic diseases	0	491	17.11	***
	1	379	28.50
	2	112	57.14
	3+	23	60.87
Diabetes	No	848	23.47	***
	Yes	157	45.86
Heart diseases	No	840	24.17	***
	Yes	164	40.85
Gastric ulcer	No	780	24.23	***
	Yes	225	36.44
COPD	No	875	24.00	***
	Yes	130	46.92
APOE4 allele carriers	No	862	25.99
	Yes	143	32.87
Financial difficulty	No	753	23.64	***
	Yes	249	37.35
Having an earthquake-damaged house	No	882	25.74	*
	Yes	123	35.77
Smokers	No	783	28.99	*
	Yes	221	19.91
Daily alcohol use	No	937	27.43
	Yes	68	20.59
Daily milk intake	No	608	27.47
	Yes	395	26.33
Vegetable and fruit diet	No	474	32.28	***
	Yes	529	22.31
# of times doing exercise/week	<=1	392	35.04	***
	2–5	198	25.25
	6+	415	20.00
Controls
Gender	Men	584	23.29	**
	Women	421	32.07
Age	<70	433	29.56
	> = 70	572	25.00
Marital status	Others	291	31.96	*
	Currently	714	24.93
Ethnicity	Fujian	712	27.39
	Hakka	122	24.59
	Mainlander	171	26.90
Rural residence	No	697	28.41
	Yes	308	23.70
Education	None	330	36.97	***
	Primary	407	25.06
	Secondary	197	17.26
	College+	71	18.31
Occupation	Professionals	58	15.52
	Clericals	215	22.79
	Blue-collar workers	348	28.45
	Farmers	384	29.69
IADL disabled	No	701	18.69	***
	Yes	304	46.05
BMI scores	<=23	939	26.30
	>23	66	36.36

(1) COPD = chronic obstructive pulmonary disease. (2) P-value reports significance of chi-square test of difference in proportion between reference categories. (3) *p < 0.05; **p < 0.01; ***p < 0.001

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