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Abstract
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Purpose：To find the differences in cancer prevalence between low and non-low income households in Taiwan from 2001 to 2010.
Method：The data were obtained from the NHIRD released by the National Health Research Institute (NHRI) in Taiwan. The National Health Insurance program finances compulsory universal health care for 99% of all of residents of Taiwan. The database contains demographic data, all health-care encounters, expenditure and dates of enrolment and withdrawal. To facilitate research, the NHRI randomly sampled a representative database of two million subjects enrolled in the National Health Insurance program by a systematic sampling method. This two-million sample was validated to be representative of the entire insured population as reported by the NHRI. Logistic regression was used to model the differences in cancer prevalence in low and non-low income households.
Results：The difference of prevalence of all cancer in non-low and low income households ranged from 1.75% to 1.90%. Generally speaking, people in low income status have higher prevalence of cancer. There was low cancer prevalence in men aged >60 years, but not reaching statistic significance. The cancer prevalence was reduced 17.99% when people shake off poverty from low income status. The OR for men and women aged 30-39 years with low income status were 2.61 and 1.36, respectively. For men and women aged 40-49 years with low income status, OR were 2.00 and 1.60, respectively. For men and women aged 50-59 years with low income status, OR were 1.10 and 1.26, respectively. For men aged 60-69 and ≧70 years in low income status, the OR were 0.74 and 0.60, but not reaching significance. There were interactions between age and social-economic status for men, but not women.
Conclusion：There were relatively strong associations between cancer prevalence and poverty in young people. There was great reduction in cancer prevalence when overcoming poverty.
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