The Relationship Between Religious Service Attendance and Coronary Heart Disease and Related Risk Factors in Saskatchewan, Canada

Research suggests that attending religious services could provide small yet important protective benefits against coronary heart disease (CHD) and CHD risk factors (e.g., diabetes, hypertension). The extent to which these benefits apply to Canada deserves study because approximately one-third of adu...

Full description

Saved in:  
Bibliographic Details
Published in:Journal of religion and health
Authors: Banerjee, Ananya Tina (Author) ; Anand, Sonia S. (Author) ; Boyle, Michael H. (Author) ; Oremus, Mark (Author) ; Strachan, Patricia H. (Author)
Format: Electronic Article
Language:English
Check availability: HBZ Gateway
Journals Online & Print:
Drawer...
Fernleihe:Fernleihe für die Fachinformationsdienste
Published: Springer Science + Business Media B. V. [2014]
In: Journal of religion and health
Further subjects:B Hypertension
B Canada
B Coronary Heart Disease
B Diabetes
B Religious service attendance
Online Access: Volltext (Resolving-System)
Description
Summary:Research suggests that attending religious services could provide small yet important protective benefits against coronary heart disease (CHD) and CHD risk factors (e.g., diabetes, hypertension). The extent to which these benefits apply to Canada deserves study because approximately one-third of adult Canadians attend religious services at least monthly. Therefore, the objective of this study is to examine the association between frequency of religious service attendance and prevalence of (1) CHD, (2) diabetes, and (3) hypertension in Canada. We used the Saskatchewan sample (n = 5,442) of the Canadian Community Health Survey (CCHS-4.1) and built multivariable logistic regression models to evaluate associations between religious service attendance and self-reported CHD, diabetes, and hypertension. After controlling for demographic, socioeconomic and health behavior variables, the association between religious service attendance and prevalence of CHD was not significant (OR = 0.82; 95 % CI 0.61-1.11). However, persons who attended religious services more than once a week exhibited lower prevalence odds of diabetes (OR = 0.60; 95 % CI 0.45-0.80) and hypertension (OR = 0.82; 95 % CI 0.68-0.99) compared to persons who attended less than once a year. The findings of this study are the first to suggest religious service attendance may be associated with a lower prevalence of CHD risk factors in Canada.
ISSN:1573-6571
Contains:Enthalten in: Journal of religion and health
Persistent identifiers:DOI: 10.1007/s10943-012-9609-6