Principal investigator; Östergren, Per-Olof, Professor, MD/PhD
Clinical speciality: Community medicine
Phone: +040-391407
Co-workers: Eva Lindbladh, PhD, Associate professor, Elizabeth Cantor-Graae, PhD, Associate professor, Maria Rosvall, MD, PhD, Charlotta Holmström, PhD
International socioepidemiological research has increasingly focused on the phenomenon of social inequalities in health, particularly in OECD countries. The basis of this interest stems from, on the one hand, a scientific reason for using such observed inequalities as a starting point of an analysis of the causes of major types of ill health in the population (which only partially can be explained from a more narrow scope of biomedical risk-factors), and on the other hand, from a health policy angle, namely the achievement of the highly prioritised health equity goal.
In our previous research, we have developed a model which attempts to integrate different scientific perspectives in the analysis of mechanisms that could explain the associations between social position and health. We have identified three important starting points for our research into this field:
Multi-risk (the tendency of accumulation of risk factors for ill health among socially marginalised individuals), a life-course perspective (the necessity of studying accumulation/progression of risk factors across the full life-course of the individual) and the multi-level approach (the need for understanding a phenomenon on several theoretical levels at the same time, e.g. the association between stress and disease both on an individual and on a community level). By utilising a combination of quantitative/epidemiological and qualitative empirical analyses, we intend to pursue our research from all the mentioned starting points. A special focus is set on the concept of social capital as a tentative determinant of health.
Future possibilities to influence population health, particularly in the direction of increased health equity, by means of health promotion programmes aiming at the general population are of immense importance from a social as well as from an economic perspective. The pre-requisites for the efficiency of such activities rest on a valid understanding of how biological, social and psychosocial factors interact in the causal chains of ill health.
5 recent original publications
Rosvall M, Östergren P-O, Hedblad B Isacsson S-O, Janzon L, Berglund G.
Work-related psychosocial factors and carotid atherosclerosis
Int J Epidemiol. 2002; 31(6): 68-73.
Lindström M, Merlo M, Östergren P-O.
Individual and neighbourhood determinants of social participation and social capital in a public health perspective: a multilevel analysis of the city of Malmö, Sweden.
Soc Sci Med. 2002; 54: 1779-91.
Giskes K. Kunst AE, Benach J, Borell c, Costa G, Dahl E, Dlastra JA, Federico B, Helmert U, Judge K, Lahelma E, Moussa K, Östergren P-O, Platt S, Prättälä R, Rasmussen NK, Mackenbach JP.
Trends in smoking behaviour between 1985 and 2000 in nine European countries by education.
J Epidemiol Community Health. 2005; 59: 395-401
Östergren P-O, Hanson BS, Balogh I, Ektor-Andersen J, Isacsson A, Örbaek P, Winkel J, Isacsson S-O, and the Malmo Shoulder Neck Study Group.
Incidence of shoulder and neck pain in a working population - effect modification between mechanical and psychosocial exposures at work?
J Epidemiol Community Health. 2005; 59: 721-8.
Rosvall M, Östergren P-O, Hedblad B Isacsson S-O, Janzon L, Berglund G.
Socioeconomic differences in the progression of carotid atherosclerosis in middle-aged men and women with subclinical atherosclerosis in Sweden.
Soc Sci Med.. 2005; Sep 19: [Epub ahead of prin]
Further publications here (new window)
Financing/year
| Total financing: | 4,2 MSEK | Gov grant for clinical research ("ALF"): | 1,0 MSEK | |
| Total external financing: | 3,2 MSEK | Natl and intl prioritized grants: | 1,0 MSEK |
