Dataset Information

Religious Service Attendance and Lower Depression Among Women-a Prospective Cohort Study.

ABSTRACT: Previous studies on the association between religious service attendance and depression have been mostly cross-sectional, subject to reverse causation, and did not account for the potential feedback between religious service attendance and depression. We prospectively evaluated evidence whether religious service attendance decreased risk of subsequent risk of depression and whether depression increased subsequent cessation of service attendance, while explicitly accounting for feedback with potential effects in both directions.We included a total of 48,984 US nurses who were participants of the Nurses' Health Study with mean age 58 years and who were followed up from 1996 to 2008. Religious service attendance was self-reported in 1992, 1996, 2000, and 2004. Depression was defined as self-reported physician-diagnosed clinical depression, regular anti-depressant use, or severe depressive symptoms. Multivariate logistic regression and marginal structural models were used to estimate the odds ratio of developing incident depression, adjusted for baseline religious service attendance, baseline depression, and time-varying covariates.Compared with women who never attended services, women who had most frequent and recent religious service attendance had the lowest risk of developing depression (odds ratio [OR] = 0.71, 95 % confidence interval [CI] 0.62-0.82). Compared with women who were not depressed, women with depression were less likely to subsequently attend religious services once or more per week (OR = 0.74, 95 % CI 0.68-0.80).In this study of US women, there is evidence that higher frequency of religious service attendance decreased the risk of incident depression and women with depression were less likely to subsequently attend services.

SUBMITTER: Li S

PROVIDER: S-EPMC5127763 | biostudies-literature | 2016 Dec

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

ACCESS DATA

Publications

Religious Service Attendance and Lower Depression Among Women-a Prospective Cohort Study.

Li Shanshan S Okereke Olivia I OI Chang Shun-Chiao SC Kawachi Ichiro I VanderWeele Tyler J TJ

Annals of behavioral medicine : a publication of the Society of Behavioral Medicine 20161201 6

<h4>Objective</h4>Previous studies on the association between religious service attendance and depression have been mostly cross-sectional, subject to reverse causation, and did not account for the potential feedback between religious service attendance and depression. We prospectively evaluated evidence whether religious service attendance decreased risk of subsequent risk of depression and whether depression increased subsequent cessation of service attendance, while explicitly accounting for ...[more]

PMID: 27393076

Similar Datasets

Project description:IMPORTANCE:Previous studies have linked suicide risk with religious participation, but the majority have used ecologic, cross-sectional, or case-control data. OBJECTIVE:To examine the longitudinal association between religious service attendance and suicide and the joint associations of suicide with service attendance and religious affiliation. DESIGN, SETTING, AND PARTICIPANTS:We evaluated associations between religious service attendance and suicide from 1996 through June 2010 in a large, long-term prospective cohort, the Nurses' Health Study, in an analysis that included 89?708 women. Religious service attendance was self-reported in 1992 and 1996. Data analysis was conducted from 1996 through 2010. MAIN OUTCOMES AND MEASURES:Cox proportional hazards regression models were used to examine the association between religious service attendance and suicide, adjusting for demographic covariates, lifestyle factors, medical history, depressive symptoms, and social integration measures. We performed sensitivity analyses to examine the influence of unmeasured confounding. RESULTS:Among 89?708 women aged 30 to 55 years who participated in the Nurses' Health Study, attendance at religious services once per week or more was associated with an approximately 5-fold lower rate of suicide compared with never attending religious services (hazard ratio, 0.16; 95% CI, 0.06-0.46). Service attendance once or more per week vs less frequent attendance was associated with a hazard ratio of 0.05 (95% CI, 0.006-0.48) for Catholics but only 0.34 (95% CI, 0.10-1.10) for Protestants (P?=?.05 for heterogeneity). Results were robust in sensitivity analysis and to exclusions of persons who were previously depressed or had a history of cancer or cardiovascular disease. There was evidence that social integration, depressive symptoms, and alcohol consumption partially mediated the association among those occasionally attending services, but not for those attending frequently. CONCLUSIONS AND RELEVANCE:In this cohort of US women, frequent religious service attendance was associated with a significantly lower rate of suicide.

Project description:ImportanceStudies on the association between attendance at religious services and mortality often have been limited by inadequate methods for reverse causation, inability to assess effects over time, and limited information on mediators and cause-specific mortality.ObjectiveTo evaluate associations between attendance at religious services and subsequent mortality in women.Design, setting, and participantsAttendance at religious services was assessed from the first questionnaire in 1992 through June 2012, by a self-reported question asked of 74 534 women in the Nurses' Health Study who were free of cardiovascular disease and cancer at baseline. Data analysis was conducted from return of the 1996 questionnaire through June 2012.Main outcomes and measuresCox proportional hazards regression model and marginal structural models with time-varying covariates were used to examine the association of attendance at religious services with all-cause and cause-specific mortality. We adjusted for a wide range of demographic covariates, lifestyle factors, and medical history measured repeatedly during the follow-up, and performed sensitivity analyses to examine the influence of potential unmeasured and residual confounding.ResultsAmong the 74 534 women participants, there were 13 537 deaths, including 2721 owing to cardiovascular deaths and 4479 owing to cancer deaths. After multivariable adjustment for major lifestyle factors, risk factors, and attendance at religious services in 1992, attending a religious service more than once per week was associated with 33% lower all-cause mortality compared with women who had never attended religious services (hazard ratio, 0.67; 95% CI, 0.62-0.71; P < .001 for trend). Comparing women who attended religious services more than once per week with those who never attend, the hazard ratio for cardiovascular mortality was 0.73 (95% CI, 0.62-0.85; P < .001 for trend) and for cancer mortality was 0.79 (95% CI, 0.70-0.89; P < .001 for trend). Results were robust in sensitivity analysis. Depressive symptoms, smoking, social support, and optimism were potentially important mediators, although the overall proportion of the association between attendance at religious services and mortality was moderate (eg, social support explained 23% of the effect [P = .003], depressive symptoms explained 11% [P < .001], smoking explained 22% [P < .001], and optimism explained 9% [P < .001]).Conclusions and relevanceFrequent attendance at religious services was associated with significantly lower risk of all-cause, cardiovascular, and cancer mortality among women. Religion and spirituality may be an underappreciated resource that physicians could explore with their patients, as appropriate.

Project description:ImportanceThe increase in deaths related to drugs, alcohol, and suicide (referred to as deaths from despair) has been identified as a public health crisis. The antecedents associated with these deaths have, however, seldom been investigated empirically.ObjectiveTo prospectively examine the association between religious service attendance and deaths from despair.Design, setting, and participantsThis population-based cohort study used data extracted from self-reported questionnaires and medical records of 66 492 female registered nurses who participated in the Nurses' Health Study II (NHSII) from 2001 through 2017 and 43 141 male health care professionals (eg, dentist, pharmacist, optometrist, osteopath, podiatrist, and veterinarian) who participated in the Health Professionals Follow-up Study (HPFS) from 1988 through 2014. Data on causes of death were obtained from death certificates and medical records. Data analysis was conducted from September 2, 2018, to July 14, 2019.ExposureReligious service attendance was self-reported at study baseline in response to the question, "How often do you go to religious meetings or services?"Main outcomes and measuresDeaths from despair, defined specifically as deaths from suicide, unintentional poisoning by alcohol or drug overdose, and chronic liver diseases and cirrhosis. Cox proportional hazards regression models were used to estimate the hazard ratio (HR) of deaths from despair by religious service attendance at study baseline, with adjustment for baseline sociodemographic characteristics, lifestyle factors, psychological distress, medical history, and other aspects of social integration.ResultsAmong the 66 492 female participants in NHSII (mean [SD] age, 46.33 [4.66] years), 75 incident deaths from despair were identified (during 1 039 465 person-years of follow-up). Among the 43 141 male participants in HPFS (mean [SD] age, 55.12 [9.53] years), there were 306 incident deaths from despair (during 973 736 person-years of follow-up). In the fully adjusted models, compared with those who never attended religious services, participants who attended services at least once per week had a 68% lower hazard (HR, 0.32; 95% CI, 0.16-0.62) of death from despair in NHSII and a 33% lower hazard (HR, 0.67; 95% CI, 0.48-0.94) of death from despair in HPFS.Conclusions and relevanceThe findings suggest that religious service attendance is associated with a lower risk of death from despair among health care professionals. These results may be important in understanding trends in deaths from despair in the general population.

Dataset Information

Religious Service Attendance and Lower Depression Among Women-a Prospective Cohort Study.

Publications

Religious Service Attendance and Lower Depression Among Women-a Prospective Cohort Study.

Similar Datasets

OmicsDI is part of the ELIXIR infrastructure

Tweets