Abstract
During and beyond the twentieth century, urbanization has represented a major demographic shift particularly in the developed world. The rapid urbanization experienced in the developing world brings increased mortality from lifestyle diseases such as cancer and cardiovascular disease. We set out to understand how urbanization has been measured in studies which examined chronic disease as an outcome. Following a pilot search of PUBMED, a full search strategy was developed to identify papers reporting the effect of urbanization in relation to chronic disease in the developing world. Full searches were conducted in MEDLINE, EMBASE, CINAHL, and GLOBAL HEALTH. Of the 868 titles identified in the initial search, nine studies met the final inclusion criteria. Five of these studies used demographic measures (such as population density) at an area level to measure urbanization. Four studies used more complicated summary measures of individual and area level data (such as distance from a city, occupation, home and land ownership) to define urbanization. The papers reviewed were limited by using simple area level summary measures (e.g., urban rural dichotomy) or having to rely on preexisting data at the individual level. Further work is needed to develop a measure of urbanization that treats urbanization as a process and which is sensitive enough to track changes in “urbanicity” and subsequent emergence of chronic disease risk factors and mortality.
Similar content being viewed by others
References
Ezzati M, Vander Hoorn S, Lawes CMM, et al. Urbanisation and health. Clin. Med. 2005;5:137–141.
Choi JY, Min Cho Y, Ku Park C, et al. Rapidly increasing diabetes-related mortality with socio-environmental changes in South Korea during the last two decades. Diabetes Res Clin Pract. 2006;74:295–300.
Murray CJL. Rethinking the “diseases of affluence” paradigm: global patterns of nutritional risks in relation to economic development. PLoS Med. 2005;2:404–412.
Popkin BM. The nutrition transition and its health implications in lower income countries. Public Health Nutr. 1998;1:5–21.
World Health Organization. The World Health Report 2007: Global Public Health Security in the 21st Century—A Safer Future. Geneva: World Health Organization; 2007.
Boutayeb A, Boutayeb S. The burden of non communicable diseases in developing countries. Int J Equity Health. 2005;4:2.
Reddy KS, Yusuf S. Emerging epidemic of cardiovascular disease in developing countries. Circulation. 1998;97:596–601.
Vlahov D, Galea S. Urbanization, urbanicity, and health. J Urban Health. 2002;79(4):S1–S12.
Mendez MA, Popkin BM. Globalization, urbanization and nutritional change in the developing world. Electron J Agric Dev Econ. 2004;1:220–241.
Mohan V, Mathur P, Deepa R, et al. Urban rural differences in prevalence of self-reported diabetes in India—The WHO-ICMR Indian NCD risk factor surveillance. Diabetes Res Clin Pract. 2008;In Press.
Galea S, Freudenberg N, Vlahov N. Cities and population health. Soc Sci Med. 2005;60:1017–1033.
World Bank. World Bank list of developing countries. Available at: http://web.worldbank.org/WBSITE/EXTERNAL/DATASTATISTICS/0,,contentMDK:20421402~pagePK:64133150~piPK:64133175~theSitePK:239419,00.html. Accessed on: April 1, 2007.
Dahly DL, Adair LS. Quantifying the urban environment: a scale measure of urbanicity outperforms the urban-rural dichotomy. Soc Sci Med. 2006;64:1407–1419.
Steyn K, Kazenellenbogen JM, Lombard CJ, Bourne LT. Urbanization and the risk for chronic diseases of lifestyle in the black population of the Cape Peninsula, South Africa. J Cardiovasc Risk. 1997;4(2):135–42.
Vorster HH, Venter CS, Wissing MP, Margetts BM. The nutrition and health transition in the North West Province of South Africa: a review of the THUSA (Transition and Health during Urbanisation of South Africans) study. Public Health Nutr. 2005;8(5):480–90.
Pick W, Cooper D. Urbanisation and women’s health in South Africa. Afr J Reprod Health. 1997;1(1):45–55 March.
Sobngwi E, Mbanya JC, Unwin NC, et al. Exposure over the life course to an urban environment and its relation with obesity, diabetes, and hypertension in rural and urban Cameroon. Int J Epidemiol. 2004;33:769–776.
Galea S, Vlahov D. Urban health: evidence, challenges, and directions. Annu Rev Public Health. 2005;26:341–365.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Electronic supplementary material
Below is the link to the electronic supplementary material.
Appendix 1
Search strategy (PDF 91kb)
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Allender, S., Foster, C., Hutchinson, L. et al. Quantification of Urbanization in Relation to Chronic Diseases in Developing Countries: A Systematic Review. J Urban Health 85, 938–951 (2008). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11524-008-9325-4
Received:
Accepted:
Published:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11524-008-9325-4