Socio-economic inequalities in health and service utilization in the London Borough of Newham

Objectives: To examine the extent of socio-economic inequalities in health in the London Borough of Newham and to compare them with those in the UK as a whole. Study design: Cross-sectional, individual-level observational study with data on socio-economic and health measures from wave one of the Newham Household Panel Survey (n=1723) and wave 11 of the British Household Panel Survey (n=8444). Methods: Age-standardized comparison of the social distribution, by household social class, education, housing conditions and neighbourhood problems, of six indicators of health and service utilization. Relative index of inequality is used to compare magnitude of inequality across the samples. Results: Age-standardized prevalence ratios for most health and service use indicators indicated that Newham has poorer health and higher utilization compared with the UK as a whole. Significant health inequalities were associated with socio-economic measures in both Newham and Britain, but few significant differences in the relative effects between the two. Conclusions: Although Newham has higher prevalence of poor health and high service use, the relative effects of socio-economic inequalities are similar to those in Britain as a whole.