Background; The overwhelming increase in studies about social capital and health occurring since 1995 indicates a renewed interest in the social determinants of health and a call for a more explicit use of theory in public health and epidemiology. The links between social capital and health are still not clear and the meanings of different forms of individual and collective social capital and their implications for health promotion needs further exploration. The overall aims of this thesis are to explore the relationship between social capital and health and to contribute to the theoretical framework of the role of social capital for health and health promotion. Methods; Data from a social capital survey were used to investigate the associations between individual social capital and self-rated health for men and women and different educational groups. Survey data were also analyzed to determine the association between collective social capital and self-rated health for men and women. A qualitative case study in a small community with observed high levels of civic engagement formed the basis for exploring the role of social capital for community action. Data from the same study were utilized for a grounded theory situational analysis of the social mechanisms leading to social capital mobilization. Main findings; Access to individual social capital increases the odds for good self-rated health equally for men and women and different educational groups. However, the likelihood of having access to social capital differs between groups. The results indicate a positive association between collective social capital and self-rated health for women but not for men. Results from the qualitative case study illustrate how social capital in local communities can facilitate collective actions for public good but may also increase social inequality. Mobilizing social capital in local communities requires identification of community issues that call for action, a fighting spirit from trusted local leaders, “know-how” from creative entrepreneurs, and broad legitimacy and support in the community. Conclusions; This thesis supports the idea that individual social capital is health-enhancing and that strengthening individual social capital can be considered one important health promotion strategy. Collective social capital may have a positive effect on self-rated health for women but not for men and therefore mobilizing collective social capital might be more health-enhancing for women. Collective social capital may have indirect positive effects on health for all by facilitating the ability of communities to solve collective health problems. However, mobilizing social capital in local communities requires an awareness of the risk for increased social inequality.

Background Most aging research comes from the developed world. Aging research in India is focused on disease states and risk factors. Evidence on elderly health, physical performance and disability to understand the psycho-social or socio-behavioral risk is limited in India. Self-rated health (SRH) is used often in survey settings to quickly assess health status and is known to predict morbidity and mortality. The first wave of the Study on global AGEing and adult health (SAGE) survey provides an opportunity to explore the complex construct of SRH in the context of the aging process in its various key life domains of health, disability, cognition, activities of daily life, work, family, security and well-being in low and middle income settings. Objectives This research aims to (a) understand pathways through which the social environment, functional disability, health behaviour and chronic disease experience influence SRH, (b) examine the role of SRH in predicting mortality, (c) validate SRH to improve its interpersonal comparability, and (d) assess how well estimates of SRH derived directly from a ‘small area’ survey compare with ‘small area’ estimates derived indirectly from a ‘large area’ survey. Methods The Vadu Health and Demographic Surveillance System (HDSS) monitor health and demographic trends in a rural population of more than 100 000 in 22 villages in India since 2002. The full and short version of the SAGE survey was implemented in Vadu in 2007-09 among 321 and 5432 individuals aged 50 years and above, respectively. A structural equation model tested pathways through which social and biological factors influenced SRH. A Cox proportional hazard model examined the role of SRH as a predictor for mortality. Anchoring vignettes were used to evaluate SRH for reporting heterogeneity. The Hierarchical Ordered Probit model adjusted SRH for reporting heterogeneity. The SRH prevalence estimates for Vadu derived indirectly (indirect synthetic estimate, empirical Bayes estimate, Hierarchical Bayes estimate) from the national SAGE survey were compared with estimates derived directly from the Vadu SAGE survey, using different design and model-based techniques. Results Older individuals reported poor SRH compared to those younger. Women rated their quality of life and SRH poorer than men. The effect of age on SRH was mediated through functional disability. Higher socioeconomic status and higher quality of life was in turn associated with better SRH but this relationship lacked statistical significance. Smoking or consumption of tobacco was associated with at least one chronic illness which in turn was associated with poor SRH and quality of life. However the association between chronic illness and SRH and quality of life was not statistically significant. Mortality risk was higher among individuals who reported bad/very bad SRH, disability and lack of spousal support independent of age and sex. There was strong evidence of reporting heterogeneity in SRH that was influenced by age, sex, education and socioeconomic status. The prevalence of ‘good / very good’ SRH was estimated to be 50%. This direct survey estimate compared well with the prevalence estimate of about 45% derived indirectly from model-based small area estimation methods. The indirect synthetic estimate for Vadu (23.2%) was a poor approximation to the direct survey or modelbased estimate. Conclusion This research establishes the value and utility of SRH as a simple measure of health and predictor of mortality in an aging context. It provides evidence to formulate programs and policies towards an enabling social environment and an ability to function in key life domains of health and well-being. It highlights the need to identify and adjust self-rated responses for interpersonal incomparability prior to making comparisons across individuals or groups of individuals. It highlights the potential of using information from large national surveys by district level managers for planning and evaluation of policies and programs at the district or sub-district level. Finally, this research provides the basis for integrating SRH and related questions into routine HDSS.

Tyrimo tikslas – ištirti moterų, sergančių krūties vėžiu, savo įvertintos sveikatos ir savijautos ypatybes aktyvaus gydymo laikotarpiu. Tyrime dalyvavo 105 krūties vėžiu sergančios moterys, besigydančios Vilniaus universiteto Onkologijos instituto III-iajame onkochirurgijos skyriaus krūties ligų chirurgijos ir onkologijos poskyryje. Tyrimo dalyvės buvo atrenkamos pagal šiuos kriterijus: moteriška lytis, nustatyta I-IV krūties vėžio stadija (karcinoma), laukiama arba jau padaryta krūties vėžio operacija gydantis stacionare, sutikusios dalyvauti tyrime. Siekiant įvertinti sergančių krūties vėžiu moterų sveikatą, pablogėjusią nuotaiką ir nusiskundimus sveikata buvo naudojamas subjektyviai vertinamos sveikatos klausimynas, pablogėjusios nuotaikos vertinimo metodika ir klinikinis struktūruotas interviu apie nusiskundimus sveikata, savijauta (Goštautas, 1998). Taip pat buvo naudojama Beko depresijos skalė – II. Norint įvertinti dėl krūties vėžio operacijos kylančius sunkumus buvo naudojama įvykio poveikio skalė – revizuota lietuviška versija (Kazlauskas, Gailienė, Domanskaitė-Gota, Trofimova, 2006). Trauminiams įvykiams vertinti Vrana-Lauterbach trauminių įvykių klausimynas civiliams (Vrana, Lauterbach, 1994). Taip pat buvo taikytas pusiau struktūruotas interviu įvertinti dėl krūties vėžio kylančius pokyčius, prašoma užpildyti klinikinius ir sociodemografinius duomenis. Atlikus tyrimą, buvo įvertinamas asmens elgesys naudojant emocinės įtampos skalę. Tyrimo rezultatai parodė... [toliau žr. visą tekstą] / The aim of the research is to analyze peculiarities of the self – rated health and general condition during the period of active treatment among women with breast cancer. In this research were participating 105 women with breast cancer, at this time treated in Vilnius University Institute of Oncology of breast disease surgery and oncology section of III-rd oncosurgery department. Participants of the research were selected by these criterions: female, I-IV stage of cancer diagnosed (carcinoma), expected or already done for breast cancer surgery during stationary treatment, agreed to participate in the research. In order to assess health, mood and health complaints among women with breast cancer were used self – rated health questionnaire, mood assessment methodology and clinical structured interview about complaints of health and general condition (Goštautas, 1998). Also been used Beck Depression Scale - II. To evaluate for breast cancer surgery the difficulties were used the Impact of Event Scale – the revised Lithuanian version (Kazlauskas, Gailienė, Domanskaitė-Gota, Trofimova, 2006). To assess traumatic events were used Vrana-Lauterbach traumatic events questionnaire for civilians (Vrana, Lauterbach, 1994). In addition, the semi-structured interview was used to assess the changes that result from breast cancer, and asked to complete the clinical and socio-demographic data. In order to assess behavior of women immediately after the research was used observational scale of... [to full text]

Work-family conflict refers to the stress and tension which arise when demands from work and family are competing and incompatible. The aim of this study was to examine the experience of work-family conflict among men and women in Sweden and Germany, and whether there was an association between work-family conflict and self-rated health. Special attention was paid to the directions of the conflict: work to family (WIF) and family to work (FIW). Moreover, the importance of gender attitudes and family policy was examined. By using cross-sectional data from the European Social Survey, the associations were analysed using regression analysis. The results showed that men in Germany experience the highest levels of work-family conflict and women in Germany the lowest. Having egalitarian gender attitudes was associated to slightly lower conflict among men only. Furthermore, high levels of work-family conflict were related to poorer self-rated health. Gender attitudes did not play a significant role in moderating this association. Altogether, the study demonstrated the importance of gender attitudes and family policy for individuals’ possibility to reconcile work and family. Hence, by facilitating for men and women to successfully combine the two domains, the risk of negative health consequences from work-family conflict may be reduced.

This cross-sectional study investigated the use of health benefits in relation to the self-rated health of employees at two medium-sized industrial enterprises in Hälsingland. The method used to investigate this was through a self-designed questionnaire consisting 19 questions about health, lifestyle and health benefits at the workplace. A total of 100 questionnaires were distributed in the two companies, hence 50 surveys at each workplace. The response rate was measured to 88 % and 74 %, which means a loss of 6 persons and 13 persons. The results showed that Company nr 1 offers its employees a health benefits consisting of free access to gym in the company premises after working hours and financial contributions to training-cards. These benefits are used regularly by 29% of respondents. Company nr 2 currently offered no health benefits for their employees. The results also showed that 66% of the respondents at Company nr 1 rated their physical health as Excellent or Good and 79% consider their mental health as Excellent or Good. At Company nr 2, 65 % of the participants responded that they consider their physical health as Excellent or Good and 84% consider their mental health as Excellent or Good. The study also found that more than half of the participants in the two companies had a BMI (Body Mass Index) greater than 26. The conclusion from this is that the health benefits offered at Company nr 1 is used sparingly and that more than half of the participants at both companies consider their physical and mental health as Excellent or Good.

Conselho Nacional de Desenvolvimento Científico e Tecnológico / A autoavaliação do estado de saúde (AAS) é um indicador de saúde amplamente utilizado e influenciado por uma grande variedade de fatores. Em particular, existem evidências crescentes de que a discriminação racial é um importante fator de risco para eventos mórbidos em saúde e seu impacto na saúde da população brasileira ainda é pouco explorado. No primeiro artigo, o objetivo principal é investigar a associação entre AAS e fatores sociodemográficos, comportamentais e de morbidade. No segundo artigo, o objetivo é estimar a associação entre discriminação racial e diferentes desfechos em saúde, a saber, AAS, morbidade física e depressão ajustando por variáveis sociodemográficas, comportamentos relacionados à saúde e Índice de Massa Corporal, na população de pretos e pardos. O presente estudo possui delineamento seccional, baseado nos dados do inquérito de abrangência nacional Pesquisa Dimensão Social das Desigualdades. Os entrevistados responderam a questionários estruturados e suas medidas antropométricas foram aferidas. No primeiro artigo, foram avaliados 12.324 indivíduos, entre chefes de família e cônjuges, com idade maior ou igual a 20 anos. No segundo artigo, foram avaliados 3.863 chefes de família que responderam a pergunta sobre discriminação racial e que se classificaram como pretos e pardos. AAS foi avaliada por meio de pergunta obtida do instrumento de qualidade de vida SF-36 e, para o primeiro artigo, foi analisada de forma dicotômica em AAS boa (categorias de resposta excelente, muito boa e boa) e AAS ruim (categorias de resposta razoável e ruim). No segundo artigo, esse desfecho foi analisado utilizando-se as 5 categorias de resposta. As análises foram realizadas utilizando-se modelos de regressão logística uni e multivariados, para dados binários (artigo 1) ou ordinais (artigo 2). Os resultados foram apresentados na forma de Odds Ratios com os respectivos intervalos de 95% de confiança. Maior faixa etária, analfabetismo, tabagismo, obesidade e doenças crônicas estiveram associados a maior chance de AAS ruim. Para cada incremento na faixa de renda, observou-se uma redução de 20% na chance de relatar AAS ruim. Atividade física esteve associada a menor chance de AAS ruim. No segundo artigo, exposição à discriminação racial esteve associada com aumento na chance de relato de pior AAS, de morbidade física e de depressão. O presente estudo identificou a influência de diversos fatores sociais, demográficos, comportamentos relacionados à saúde e morbidade física na AAS. O estudo demonstrou ainda que a discriminação racial está associada negativamente aos três desfechos em saúde avaliados (AAS, morbidade física e depressão). Esses resultados podem traçar um perfil de subgrupos populacionais mais vulneráveis, ou seja, com maior risco de contrair doenças ou de procurar o serviço de saúde por uma doença já existente, auxiliando na definição de populações-alvo para o adequado planejamento de políticas e de programas de promoção de saúde. / Self-rated health (SRH) is a health indicator widely used in surveys and affected by many factors. There is increasing evidence showing that racial discrimination is an important risk factor for morbid events on health and its impact on health of the Brazilian population is still poorly understood. In the first paper, the main purpose is to investigate the association between SRH and social and demographic factors, health behaviors and morbidity. In the second paper, the main purpose is to estimate the association between racial discrimination and different health outcomes, such as: SRH, physical morbidity and depression, controlling for social and demographic variables, health behaviors and Body Mass Index, in the population of blacks and mullatoes. This study has a cross-sectional design and is based on data obtained from the national survey Research for Social Dimension of Inequalities. The interviewees answered to a structured questionnaire and had their anthropometric measures collected. In the first paper, 12,324 household chiefs and their spouses, aged 20 years or older, were evaluated. In the second paper, the study population was composed of 3,863 family chiefs who answered to the question about racial discrimination and who classified themselves as blacks or mullatoes. The measurement of SRH was based on the question obtained from the SF-36 quality-of-life questionnaire. For the first paper, SRH was treated as a dichotomous variable: Good (categories: Excellent, Very Good and Good) and Poor (Regular and Bad). For the second paper, the five original categories were considered. Analysis will be developed using univariate and multivariate logistic regression models for binary (paper 1) and ordinal data (paper 2). Results were presented in the form of Odds Ratios and respective 95% confidence intervals. Older age, illiteracy, smoking habits, obesity and chronic diseases were associated to higher chances of having poor SRH. As income increased, it was observed a reduction of 20% in the chance of having poor SRH. Physical activity was associated to a lower chance of having poor SRH. In the second paper, racial discrimination was associated to a higher chance of having: poor SRH, physical morbidity and depression. The present study identified the influence of several social and demographic factors, health behaviors, and physical morbidity in SRH. Individuals with poor SRH will compose the health services demand. It also showed that racial discrimination was negatively associated to the three evaluated health outcomes (SRH, physical morbidity and depression). These results may trace profiles of vulnerable population subgroups, that is, people with higher risks of becoming ill or of searching for health services because of an existent disease. This find may help in the definitions of target populations for the adequate establishment of health planning and programs

This thesis presents five standalone essays that demonstrate the feasibility and utility of employing advanced analytic techniques to cross-sectional data from Indonesia in order to deal with some technical challenges typically encountered either in the estimation of social gradient in health or in the monitoring and evaluation of well-being as a multidimensional construct. The first essay estimates the causal effect of poverty on mental health by exploiting a natural experiment induced by weather variability across 440 districts in the Indonesian archipelago. The second essay applies parametric anchoring vignette methodology to investigate the extent to which the estimates of demographic and socio-economic inequalities in self-rated health are biased by survey respondents' differential reporting behaviour. The third essay formally assesses the existence and identifies the social determinants of the double burden of malnutrition in Indonesia using a variant of a generalised linear mixed model. The fourth essay maps the social and spatial distributions of malaria in 27 districts in Indonesian Papua using a probabilistic disease mapping technique that is capable of accounting for the complex dependency structure of spatially-correlated multilevel data. The fifth essay examines the extent and patterns of multidimensional poverty in Indonesia over the last decade using a novel poverty measurement method that is sensitive to both the incidence and intensity of multiple deprivations in income, health and education domains. Together, these essays show that although health and social researchers in the developing world have little choice but to conduct cross-sectional studies, new insights can sometimes be gained if one is willing to look at existing data through a new lens. In all five cases presented here, this approach is proved to be useful in shaping practical policy-making.

Submitted by Maria Creuza Silva (mariakreuza@yahoo.com.br) on 2013-05-14T14:27:46Z No. of bitstreams: 1 Tese Damião Ernane Souza. 2012.pdf: 2244792 bytes, checksum: 6559b201cc7a67973a079d399248834e (MD5) / Approved for entry into archive by Maria Creuza Silva(mariakreuza@yahoo.com.br) on 2013-05-14T14:28:09Z (GMT) No. of bitstreams: 1 Tese Damião Ernane Souza. 2012.pdf: 2244792 bytes, checksum: 6559b201cc7a67973a079d399248834e (MD5) / Made available in DSpace on 2013-05-14T14:28:09Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 Tese Damião Ernane Souza. 2012.pdf: 2244792 bytes, checksum: 6559b201cc7a67973a079d399248834e (MD5) Previous issue date: 2012 / Esta é uma revisão sistemática da literatura epidemiológica sobre saúde autorreferida precária (SAR-P), com foco em estimativas da prevalência e fatores associados. SAR-P compreende um construto conceitualmente ligado à percepção individual do estado de saúde e sintetiza várias dimensões da vida abordadas em escalas próprias de mensuração. Procedeu-se ao rastreamento eletrônico de artigos publicados de 1998 a 2010 nas seguintes bases de dados: Medline/Pubmed, BIREME, SciELO, Biomed Central Journals, New England Journal of Medicine e Scirus (Elsevier) e scholar.google (Google Acadêmico®), utilizando-se os seguintes descritores: self-rated health, self-reported health, self assessed health e perceived health. Localizados 415 artigos, 33 foram selecionados para revisão de acordo com os seguintes critérios: estudos que utilizaram SAR como medida de saúde e em cuja análise fosse utilizada a SAR-P como desfecho em grupos ou amostras da população geral. A maioria dos estudos era do tipo transversal, utilizava escalas de cinco pontos para SAR (muito ruim, ruim, boa, muito boa, excelente) e definia o caso de SAR-P a partir da fusão das duas categorias inferiores da escala (muito ruim + ruim), cuja prevalência variou de 4 a 65,1%. Nos estudos analisados, a SAR-P estava associada a vários fatores, desde níveis macrocontextuais a níveis individuais. Foram identificados fatores associados à SAR-P como sexo feminino, idade avançada e cor da pele não branca; entretanto, piores condições socioeconômicas destacaram-se como principais preditoras de SAR-P, em todos os níveis contextuais, em especial escolaridade, renda e trabalho. Os achados dessa revisão apontam para a importância da auto-avaliação da saúde como indicador capaz de refletir várias dimensões da vida, configurando-se como alternativa para mensuração da saúde individual, capaz de sintetizar as dimensões física, mental e social. / Salvador

Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior / O objetivo desta tese é enriquecer o campo do trânsito religioso investigando a associação da religião com a saúde das pessoas e com seus hábitos de vida principalmente o cigarro. A tese foi dividida em duas partes: a primeira visa identificar a associação entre a autopercepção da saúde, a religião e o trânsito religioso. A segunda entre religião, trânsito religioso e o hábito de fumar. Para tanto, foram analisados dados transversais do Estudo Pró-Saúde realizado no Rio de Janeiro-RJ no ano de 1999. As religiões foram categorizadas de acordo com os critérios do Instituto Brasileiro de Geografia e Estatística (IBGE) e o trânsito religioso derivou da comparação entre religião de criação e religião relatada em 1999. Os resultados evidenciaram que 62% dos participantes mantiveram-se na religião de criação, 26% mudaram de religião e 12% mudaram para sem religião. O trânsito religioso foi marcado por um crescimento de kardecistas e do grupo sem religião. As pessoas que perceberam a sua saúde regular ou ruim apresentaram chance 40% mais elevada de ter mudado de religião, quando comparadas àquelas que a perceberam como boa ou muito boa (artigo 1). A maior parte das religiões apresentaram-se negativamente associadas ao consumo de cigarros quando comparados às pessoas sem religião ajustadas por variáveis sociodemográficas, relacionadas à saúde e transtorno mental comum. Os pentecostais e protestantes históricos apresentaram uma maior associação negativa com o consumo de cigarros e apenas a religião afro-brasileira apresentou uma chance mais elevada de consumo. As pessoas que mudaram de religião apresentaram uma chance 40% mais elevada de ser um ex-fumante quando comparadas a quem não mudou de religião (artigo 2). Para esclarecer as associações observadas na presente tese, é necessário a realização de estudos posteriores com emprego de outras metodologias, especialmente com o delineamento longitudinal.

Conselho Nacional de Desenvolvimento Científico e Tecnológico / A autoavaliação do estado de saúde (AAS) é um indicador de saúde amplamente utilizado e influenciado por uma grande variedade de fatores. Em particular, existem evidências crescentes de que a discriminação racial é um importante fator de risco para eventos mórbidos em saúde e seu impacto na saúde da população brasileira ainda é pouco explorado. No primeiro artigo, o objetivo principal é investigar a associação entre AAS e fatores sociodemográficos, comportamentais e de morbidade. No segundo artigo, o objetivo é estimar a associação entre discriminação racial e diferentes desfechos em saúde, a saber, AAS, morbidade física e depressão ajustando por variáveis sociodemográficas, comportamentos relacionados à saúde e Índice de Massa Corporal, na população de pretos e pardos. O presente estudo possui delineamento seccional, baseado nos dados do inquérito de abrangência nacional Pesquisa Dimensão Social das Desigualdades. Os entrevistados responderam a questionários estruturados e suas medidas antropométricas foram aferidas. No primeiro artigo, foram avaliados 12.324 indivíduos, entre chefes de família e cônjuges, com idade maior ou igual a 20 anos. No segundo artigo, foram avaliados 3.863 chefes de família que responderam a pergunta sobre discriminação racial e que se classificaram como pretos e pardos. AAS foi avaliada por meio de pergunta obtida do instrumento de qualidade de vida SF-36 e, para o primeiro artigo, foi analisada de forma dicotômica em AAS boa (categorias de resposta excelente, muito boa e boa) e AAS ruim (categorias de resposta razoável e ruim). No segundo artigo, esse desfecho foi analisado utilizando-se as 5 categorias de resposta. As análises foram realizadas utilizando-se modelos de regressão logística uni e multivariados, para dados binários (artigo 1) ou ordinais (artigo 2). Os resultados foram apresentados na forma de Odds Ratios com os respectivos intervalos de 95% de confiança. Maior faixa etária, analfabetismo, tabagismo, obesidade e doenças crônicas estiveram associados a maior chance de AAS ruim. Para cada incremento na faixa de renda, observou-se uma redução de 20% na chance de relatar AAS ruim. Atividade física esteve associada a menor chance de AAS ruim. No segundo artigo, exposição à discriminação racial esteve associada com aumento na chance de relato de pior AAS, de morbidade física e de depressão. O presente estudo identificou a influência de diversos fatores sociais, demográficos, comportamentos relacionados à saúde e morbidade física na AAS. O estudo demonstrou ainda que a discriminação racial está associada negativamente aos três desfechos em saúde avaliados (AAS, morbidade física e depressão). Esses resultados podem traçar um perfil de subgrupos populacionais mais vulneráveis, ou seja, com maior risco de contrair doenças ou de procurar o serviço de saúde por uma doença já existente, auxiliando na definição de populações-alvo para o adequado planejamento de políticas e de programas de promoção de saúde. / Self-rated health (SRH) is a health indicator widely used in surveys and affected by many factors. There is increasing evidence showing that racial discrimination is an important risk factor for morbid events on health and its impact on health of the Brazilian population is still poorly understood. In the first paper, the main purpose is to investigate the association between SRH and social and demographic factors, health behaviors and morbidity. In the second paper, the main purpose is to estimate the association between racial discrimination and different health outcomes, such as: SRH, physical morbidity and depression, controlling for social and demographic variables, health behaviors and Body Mass Index, in the population of blacks and mullatoes. This study has a cross-sectional design and is based on data obtained from the national survey Research for Social Dimension of Inequalities. The interviewees answered to a structured questionnaire and had their anthropometric measures collected. In the first paper, 12,324 household chiefs and their spouses, aged 20 years or older, were evaluated. In the second paper, the study population was composed of 3,863 family chiefs who answered to the question about racial discrimination and who classified themselves as blacks or mullatoes. The measurement of SRH was based on the question obtained from the SF-36 quality-of-life questionnaire. For the first paper, SRH was treated as a dichotomous variable: Good (categories: Excellent, Very Good and Good) and Poor (Regular and Bad). For the second paper, the five original categories were considered. Analysis will be developed using univariate and multivariate logistic regression models for binary (paper 1) and ordinal data (paper 2). Results were presented in the form of Odds Ratios and respective 95% confidence intervals. Older age, illiteracy, smoking habits, obesity and chronic diseases were associated to higher chances of having poor SRH. As income increased, it was observed a reduction of 20% in the chance of having poor SRH. Physical activity was associated to a lower chance of having poor SRH. In the second paper, racial discrimination was associated to a higher chance of having: poor SRH, physical morbidity and depression. The present study identified the influence of several social and demographic factors, health behaviors, and physical morbidity in SRH. Individuals with poor SRH will compose the health services demand. It also showed that racial discrimination was negatively associated to the three evaluated health outcomes (SRH, physical morbidity and depression). These results may trace profiles of vulnerable population subgroups, that is, people with higher risks of becoming ill or of searching for health services because of an existent disease. This find may help in the definitions of target populations for the adequate establishment of health planning and programs