A cross-sectional study on socioeconomic status and health-related quality of life among elderly Chinese

Objectives: To examine the association between socioeconomic status (SES) and health-related quality of life (HRQOL) in a sample of elderly Chinese people in Hong Kong. Study Design: Cross-sectional study. Setting: 18 elderly health centers in Hong Kong. Participants: This study was based on a cohort aged 65 years or above who were enrolled in the Elderly Health Services from 1998 to 2005 in Hong Kong. Initially, 3324 individuals were randomly sampled from the baseline database. In the end, 2441 successful cases were obtained for the telephone survey. After excluding cases with missing SES or HRQOL information and the cases whose questionnaires were answered by their family members, 2347 individuals were included in the final analysis. Results: Elderly Chinese with less subjective economic hardship reported much better self-rated health (SRH) (OR 1.57-4.70, all p<0.01)