Certain cancers are more commonly diagnosed in people with higher socioeconomic status.
It's a widely held belief that people with lower incomes are more susceptible to illnesses than those with more money. However, certain types of cancer are more frequently diagnosed in people with higher socioeconomic status. Recently, a new study conducted at the University of Helsinki in Finland looked at the relationship between socioeconomic status and various diseases.
Research has found that wealthy people have a higher genetic risk of developing cancer than poorer people. Research has found that wealthy people have a higher genetic risk of developing breast, prostate and other cancers.
Meanwhile, less well-off people are genetically more susceptible to diabetes, arthritis, depression, alcoholism and lung cancer. The New York Times Notably, this is the first study to explore associations across 19 diseases common in high-income countries.
“Understanding that the impact of polygenic scores on disease risk is context dependent could lead to more stratified screening protocols,” Dr Hagenbeek told Southwest News Service.
“For example, in the future, improved breast cancer screening protocols may allow women with higher genetic risk and higher levels of education to be screened earlier or more frequently than women with lower genetic risk or lower levels of education,” she said.
For the study, the research team collected health data, socioeconomic status and genomic information from 280,000 Finnish citizens aged 35 to 80.
“Most clinical risk prediction models include basic demographic information such as biological sex and age, and recognize that disease incidence differs between men and women and is age-dependent,” Dr. Hagenbeek said.
“Recognizing that context matters when integrating genetic information into healthcare is an important first step, but now we can show that genetic predictions of disease risk also depend on an individual's socioeconomic background,” she said.
“So while our genetic information remains constant throughout our lives, the impact of our genetics on disease risk can change as we get older and our circumstances change,” the doctor added.
Researchers are now considering conducting studies to understand the association between specific occupations and the risk of the disease.
