Favorable and unfavorable health conditions within OECD countries: An exploratory study

OBJECTIVES: This study compared the physical, mental, and social health levels among Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development countries. METHODS: We sampled from 34 Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development member countries and divided physical, mental, and social health into three domains based on World Health Organization health definitions. RESULTS: A multivariate hierarchical cluster analysis was conducted to group countries that were similar in terms of health. Regarding physical health, Japan, South Korea, Sweden, Switzerland, and ten more countries reported favorable health conditions. For mental health, Australia, Canada and eight more countries revealed favorable conditions. Finally, in terms of social health, Austria, Finland, Iceland, and seven more countries reported favorable conditions. Sweden and Switzerland reported the best health conditions aggregated across all three domains. Conversely, Estonia, Hungary, and Turkey reported comparatively poorer health across all three domains when compared with other Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development countries. CONCLUSIONS: We suggested that mental health policy should be further strengthened in cases of Korea and Japan. In case of the Eastern Bloc countries, health policies should be established focusing on health equity for effective improvement of indicators.