Citation

Lee SK, Kwon YJ. BMC Public Health 2024; 24(1): e2189.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2024, Holtzbrinck Springer Nature Publishing Group - BMC)

DOI

10.1186/s12889-024-19665-6

PMID

39134957

Abstract

OBJECTIVE: To examine the association between patterns of alcohol consumption in the past and the risk of depression among medical aid beneficiaries and National Health Insurance beneficiaries in Korea.

METHODS: We used data from the National Health Information Database (NHID) of 1,292,618 participants who underwent health checkups in 2015-16 and 2017-18. We categorized alcohol consumption into four groups: continuous high, increased, decreased, and non-consumers. We followed the participants from 2019 to 2021 and identified new episodes of depression. We calculated adjusted odds ratios (aOR) and 95% confidence intervals (CI) for depression by alcohol consumption groups and socioeconomic status.

RESULTS: Medical aid beneficiaries had higher risks of depression than National Health Insurance beneficiaries across all alcohol consumption groups. The highest risk was observed among continuous high consumers (aOR, 2.31; 95% CI, 1.36-3.93), followed by increased (aOR, 1.51; 95% CI, 1.17-1.94), decreased (aOR, 1.48; 95% CI, 1.18-1.84), and non-consumers (aOR, 1.37; 95% CI, 1.22-1.54).

CONCLUSIONS: Socioeconomic status and patterns of alcohol consumption in the past are associated with the risk of depression. Public health interventions should consider both factors to reduce alcohol-related depression and health inequalities.

Language: en

Keywords

Humans; Adult; Aged; Female; Male; Middle Aged; Socioeconomic Factors; *Poverty; Depression; Young Adult; Cohort Studies; Social Class; Socioeconomic status; Health Status Disparities; *Alcohol Drinking/epidemiology; Republic of Korea/epidemiology; *Depression/epidemiology; *National Health Programs/statistics & numerical data; Alcohol consumption; Medical Assistance/statistics & numerical data; Socioeconomic Disparities in Health