Geographical variations of socioeconomic status and prostate cancer mortality in Taiwan

A population-wide study was conducted to determine the association between area-level socioeconomic status and prostate cancer mortality in Taiwan.

Age-period-cohort analysis was performed to adjust the time-trend variation. The area-level socioeconomic factors included proportion with a higher education, average income tax, population density, and clinical workload.

After adjustment for time-trend variations in age, period, and cohort, prostate cancer mortality was significantly lower in the groups with the highest higher education proportion (rate ratio 0.88; 95% Confidence Intervals 0.83-0.93), average income tax (RR 0.90; 95% CIs 0.86-0.94), and population density (RR 0.88; 95% CI 0.83-0.93). When all variables were incorporated into one model, the rate ratio of prostate cancer mortality was 0.92 (95% CIs 0.88-0.97) in the region with the highest average income tax level compared with that with the lowest level, but differences in the other socioeconomic factors were not significant.

This study revealed a significantly lower prostate cancer mortality rate in areas with a high higher education proportion, average income tax level, and population density compared with areas of low socioeconomic status in Taiwan.