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Context, health and migration: a systematic review of natural experiments

BACKGROUND: Migration health research pays little attention to the places into which people migrate. Studies on health effects of contextual factors are often limited because of the ability of individuals to self-select their environment, but natural experiments may allow for the causal effect of co...

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Autores principales: Biddle, Louise, Hintermeier, Maren, Costa, Diogo, Wasko, Zahia, Bozorgmehr, Kayvan
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: Elsevier 2023
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10626165/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/37936656
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.eclinm.2023.102206
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author Biddle, Louise
Hintermeier, Maren
Costa, Diogo
Wasko, Zahia
Bozorgmehr, Kayvan
author_facet Biddle, Louise
Hintermeier, Maren
Costa, Diogo
Wasko, Zahia
Bozorgmehr, Kayvan
author_sort Biddle, Louise
collection PubMed
description BACKGROUND: Migration health research pays little attention to the places into which people migrate. Studies on health effects of contextual factors are often limited because of the ability of individuals to self-select their environment, but natural experiments may allow for the causal effect of contexts to be examined. The objective was to synthesise the evidence on contextual health effects from natural experiments among migrant groups. METHODS: We performed a systematic review of natural experiments among migrant populations in PubMed/MEDLINE, The Cochrane Library, Web of Science, CINAHL and Google Scholar for literature published until 13 October 2022. 5870 articles were screened in duplicate using the following inclusion criteria: quantitative natural experiment design, migrant population, context factor as treatment variable and health or healthcare outcome variable. Synthesis without meta-analysis was performed following quality appraisal using the EPHPP tool for quantitative studies and data extraction (PROSPERO: CRD42020169236). FINDINGS: The 46 included articles provide evidence for negative effects of neighbourhood disadvantage on physical health and mortality, while finding mixed effects on mental health. Articles comparing migrants with those that stayed behind demonstrate detrimental effects of migration and adverse post-migratory contexts on physical health and mortality, while demonstrating favourable effects for mental and child health. Natural experiments of policy environments indicate the negative impacts of restrictive migration and social policies on healthcare utilization, mental health and mortality, as well as the positive health effects when restrictions are lifted. INTERPRETATION: Natural experiments complement observational studies and provide robust evidence to advocate for more inclusive migration, health and social policies as well as neighbourhood improvement programmes. In order to strengthen the methodological approach, future research utilising natural experiments should be more explicit in the mechanisms underlying the experiment and provide details on potential causal mechanisms for the observed effects. FUNDING: German Science Foundation (FOR: 2928/GZ: BO5233/1-1).
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spelling pubmed-106261652023-11-07 Context, health and migration: a systematic review of natural experiments Biddle, Louise Hintermeier, Maren Costa, Diogo Wasko, Zahia Bozorgmehr, Kayvan eClinicalMedicine Articles BACKGROUND: Migration health research pays little attention to the places into which people migrate. Studies on health effects of contextual factors are often limited because of the ability of individuals to self-select their environment, but natural experiments may allow for the causal effect of contexts to be examined. The objective was to synthesise the evidence on contextual health effects from natural experiments among migrant groups. METHODS: We performed a systematic review of natural experiments among migrant populations in PubMed/MEDLINE, The Cochrane Library, Web of Science, CINAHL and Google Scholar for literature published until 13 October 2022. 5870 articles were screened in duplicate using the following inclusion criteria: quantitative natural experiment design, migrant population, context factor as treatment variable and health or healthcare outcome variable. Synthesis without meta-analysis was performed following quality appraisal using the EPHPP tool for quantitative studies and data extraction (PROSPERO: CRD42020169236). FINDINGS: The 46 included articles provide evidence for negative effects of neighbourhood disadvantage on physical health and mortality, while finding mixed effects on mental health. Articles comparing migrants with those that stayed behind demonstrate detrimental effects of migration and adverse post-migratory contexts on physical health and mortality, while demonstrating favourable effects for mental and child health. Natural experiments of policy environments indicate the negative impacts of restrictive migration and social policies on healthcare utilization, mental health and mortality, as well as the positive health effects when restrictions are lifted. INTERPRETATION: Natural experiments complement observational studies and provide robust evidence to advocate for more inclusive migration, health and social policies as well as neighbourhood improvement programmes. In order to strengthen the methodological approach, future research utilising natural experiments should be more explicit in the mechanisms underlying the experiment and provide details on potential causal mechanisms for the observed effects. FUNDING: German Science Foundation (FOR: 2928/GZ: BO5233/1-1). Elsevier 2023-09-18 /pmc/articles/PMC10626165/ /pubmed/37936656 http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.eclinm.2023.102206 Text en © 2023 The Author(s) https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/).
spellingShingle Articles
Biddle, Louise
Hintermeier, Maren
Costa, Diogo
Wasko, Zahia
Bozorgmehr, Kayvan
Context, health and migration: a systematic review of natural experiments
title Context, health and migration: a systematic review of natural experiments
title_full Context, health and migration: a systematic review of natural experiments
title_fullStr Context, health and migration: a systematic review of natural experiments
title_full_unstemmed Context, health and migration: a systematic review of natural experiments
title_short Context, health and migration: a systematic review of natural experiments
title_sort context, health and migration: a systematic review of natural experiments
topic Articles
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10626165/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/37936656
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.eclinm.2023.102206
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