The Role of Housing Type and Housing Quality in Urban Children with Asthma

The goal of this study was to assess the relationship between type and quality of housing and childhood asthma in an urban community with a wide gradient of racial/ethnic, socioeconomic, and housing characteristics. A parent-report questionnaire was distributed in 26 randomly selected New York City public elementary schools. Type of housing was categorized using the participants’ addresses and the Building Information System, a publicly-accessible database from the New York City Department of Buildings. Type of housing was associated with childhood asthma with the highest prevalence of asthma found in public housing (21.8%). Residents of all types of private housing had lower odds of asthma than children living in public housing. After adjusting for individual- and community-level demographic and economic factors, the relationship between housing type and childhood asthma persisted, with residents of private family homes having the lowest odds of current asthma when compared to residents of public housing (odds ratio: 0.51; 95% confidence interval, 0.22, 1.21). Factors associated with housing quality explain some of the clustering of asthma in public housing. For example, the majority (68.7%) of public housing residents reported the presence of cockroaches, compared to 21% of residents of private houses. Reported cockroaches, rats, and water leaks were also independently associated with current asthma. These findings suggest differential exposure and asthma risk by urban housing type. Interventions aimed at reducing these disparities should consider multiple aspects of the home environment, especially those that are not directly controlled by residents.     

Housing issues of persons with AIDS

The housing status of persons with HIV/AIDS is a central issue in their care and prognosis. We conducted eight focus groups to explore the housing needs of special populations of persons with HIV/AIDS in New York State; these populations included substance users, ex-offenders, persons with documented histories of homelessness, and rural dwellers/migrant workers. For the focus groups, 52 participants were recruited from the clientele of health and social service agencies. A major theme was the potent effect that housing situations had on participants’ health. Participants frequently attributed lowered T-cell counts and increased lethargy to the stress associated with governmental rules and paperwork. Lack of money, inadequacy of entitlements, and high costs of housing were the major barriers to securing stable and appropriate housing. Furthermore, participants experienced housing discrimination based on HIV status and experience with the criminal justice system or drugs.     

Housing

The AIDS Healthcare Foundation is suing the Los Angeles City Housing Department to change the way funds are distributed under the Federal Housing Opportunities for People with AIDS (HOPWA) program. The suit seeks an injunction to make the city comply with its Federal contract to house homeless people. A legislative committee has agreed to investigate the city's handling of funds, which may include as much as $17 million in unspent HOPWA funds.     

Housing cuts

Congress has cut $10 million from the current $225 million budget of the Housing Opportunities for People with AIDS (HOPWA) program. The Clinton administration estimates these cuts could cause 16,000 Americans to lose access to housing. Congress will pass appropriation bills by September 30.     

Housing circumstances and standards of families with disabled children

Research on the impact of a disabled child on family resources suggests that housing standards are likely to be lower for these families than for other families. This article attempts to assess the extent to which this is actually the case. The article employs data from a nationally representative sample of disabled children and compares their housing standards according to five criteria with those of a control sample. Families with disabled children were found to be significantly more likely than control families to be living in local authority housing, more likely to be living in overcrowded accommodation and less likely to have central heating and certain consumer durables in the household.     

Housing stressors and persons with serious mental health problems

This paper describes the correlates and predictors of exposure to housing stressors among a sample of people with serious mental health problems and assesses the extent to which this experience detracts from their well-being in the community. Data were collected in a cross-sactional, two-city sample study conducted in two of New Zealand's largest cities, Auckland and Christchurch. Respondents were 203 former psychiatric inpatients, who, compared to random samples of the general population in the two cities, were younger, more often single, more residentially mobile, and more likely to be of ethnic minority status. Measures of respondents’ housing situations and standard demographic variables were collected, along with outcome measures including the World Health Organization Alcohol Use Disorders Identification Test (AUDIT) (Babor & Grant 1989) and the 12-item General Health Questionnaire (GHQ-12) (Goldberg & Williams 1988). The principal housing problem in both cities was overcrowding. Coldness, cost and issues of maintenance were also of concern. Respondents could generally cite only passive coping strategies for dealing with these housing problems. Factor analysis was used to identify three housing stressor scales:‘physical condition’,‘cost’, and 'space/amenity’. Multiple regression analysis demonstrated that socio-economic factors are significant predictors of housing stressors, with those respondents most dependent on social welfare living in the worst dwellings, as measured by the‘physical condition’ scale. This scale had the strongest relationship with psychiatric distress, as measured by the GHQ. These results lead us to conclude that concerns with respect to housing for people with serious mental health problems must move beyond issued of availability and affordability and embrace the quality of housing.     

住房与健康

调查显示,人们每天平均有14h在自己的家里度过,因此,住房就成了人们主要的活动场所。然而,住房对居民的健康有什么影响,住房是通过什么方式来影响居民健康的,住房在居民健康影响程度有多大等等,对这些问题的回答也显得越来越重要。该文主要综述了国内外住房与健康的研究现状。国外在此方面已经有一定的研究,但是,我国在住房与健康方面的研究尚处起步阶段。     

Housing Quality,Housing Instability,and Maternal Mental Health

Poor housing conditions and residential instability have been associated with distress among women; however, this association could be the result of other social factors related to housing, such as intimate partner violence (IPV) and economic hardship. We examined associations of housing conditions and instability with maternal depression and generalized anxiety disorder (GAD) while accounting for IPV and economic hardship in the Fragile Families and Child Wellbeing Study (N = 2,104). In the third study wave, interviewers rated indoor housing quality, including housing deterioration (e.g., peeling paint and holes in floor) and housing disarray (e.g., dark, crowded, and noisy). Mothers reported whether they had moved more than twice in the past two years, an indicator of housing instability. A screening for depression and GAD was obtained from questions derived from the Composite International Diagnostic Interview-Short Form in the second and third study waves. IPV and economic hardship were assessed through questionnaire. In this sample, 16% of women were classified as having probable depression and 5% as having probable GAD. In adjusted analyses, mothers experiencing housing disarray (odds ratio [OR], 1.3 [95% confidence interval (CI), 1.0, 1.7]) and instability (OR, 1.4 [95% CI, 1.2, 2.3]) were more likely to screen positive for depression. In addition, those experiencing housing instability were more likely to screen positive for GAD (OR 1.9 [95% CI, 1.2, 3.0]) even after adjusting for other social factors. No associations were noted between housing deterioration and maternal mental health. Similar associations were noted when incident cases of probable depression and GAD were examined. Housing instability and disarray, but not deterioration, are associated with screening positive for depression and generalized anxiety among women regardless of other social stressors present in their lives. Housing could potentially present a point of intervention to prevent mental health consequences among mothers and possibly their children.