Native Hawaiian and Other Pacific Islanders: Disparities in the Prevalence of Multiple Chronic Conditions

Abstract

Purpose

To examine multimorbidity prevalence by race/ethnicity and unique health disparities for Native Hawaiian and Other Pacific Islanders (NHPI).

Design

Cross-sectional study.

Setting

This study uses combined data from the 2014 National Health Interview Survey (NHIS) and the 2014 NHPI-NHIS.

Sample

38,965 adults, including a representative sample of 2,026 NHPIs.

Measures

Self-reported diagnoses of ten chronic conditions and race/ethnicity, including Non-Hispanic (NH) Whites, NH Blacks, NH Asians, NH NHPIs, Hispanics and NH Mixed Race. Covariates include age, sex, marital status, education, family income, and employment status.

Analysis

We used multinomial logistic regression models to evaluate the adjusted association between race/ethnicity and number of chronic conditions: none, 1, and ≥ 2 (multimorbidity).

Results

Compared to Whites, Asians and Hispanics (aRRR = 0.39, P < .001 and aRRR = 0.59, P < .001) had significantly lower odds of having multimorbidity relative to no chronic condition. In contrast, Black Americans and NHPIs (aRRR = 1.27, P < .001 and aRRR = 1.22, P < .05) had significantly higher odds of multimorbidity compared to Whites. Of note, NHPIs showed significantly higher odds of multimorbidity compared to Asians (aRRR = 3.07, P < .001).

Conclusion

Our findings highlight significantly higher risk of multimorbidity for NHPIs relative to Whites as well as Asians. This underscores the importance of disaggregating NHPI data from Asians as a whole. Future studies should incorporate additional social factors relevant to the NHPI community.

Keywords

Native Hawaiian Pacific Islander chronic conditions multimorbidity racial and ethnic health disparities

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