Socio-economic inequalities in health-related quality of life among Iranian young people in the middle stage of adolescence: application of Health Equity Assessment Toolkit

Background: One of the main concerns of public health is the increasing inequality of health status, which has an adverse effect on people's life.

Purpose: The current study aims to analyze the role of socioeconomic inequalities in health-related quality of life (QoL) among Iranian young people in the middle stage of adolescence.

Methods: A cross-sectional descriptive study was conducted on 576 young people in the middle stage of adolescence. The samples were selected using the Multi-stage sampling method. Data were collected by a demographic checklist, and KIDSCREEN-52 questionnaire and analyzed by SPSS ver.16. The Health Equity Assessment Toolkit (HEAT) Version 4.0 (beta) was used to assess adolescents' QoL inequalities in terms of socio-economic subgroups.

Results: The results show that 27.2 adolescents had low quality of life. The score of physical and autonomy components of QoL was significantly more in male versus school environment in female adolescents. Also, the asset index, father's, and mother's education, and family income in female adolescents, and the assets and family income in male adolescents were significantly related to the quality of life (p < 0.05). The risk of lower QOL in the poorest quintile was 1.12 times more than in the richest quintile. The consideration index of Asset in terms of sex was 4.5 and the modified Gini index was more than 0.5 in females and males.

Conclusion: Our findings highlight the significant effects of socioeconomic inequality on the HRQL of Iranian adolescents. Requires a targeted policy approach to reach the poorest quintile for improving the quality of life of adolescents.