Health status comparison between a sample of immigrant and native adolescents

Objectives: 1.º To establish the Primary Care demands of immigrant adolescents compared to those of native teenagers and study if those differences are due to their health status. 2.º To identify the reasons that determine the differences in health status. Material and methods: unique phase cross sectional survey with self filled questionnaire set in a high school of Madrid (Spain). 60 teenagers (30 natives and 30 immigrants) of ages between 14 and 17 years answered the CHIP-AE (health status questionnaire). The main outcome measures were domains and subdomains of the CHIP-AE and demographic markers. Results: the average stay in our country for immigrants was 3.7 years (SD 1.36). When facing a health problem, 36.7% of immigrant teenagers visited their Primary Care physician against 26.7 % of the native youth. Seventy-five point fifty-eight percent of those who did not visit their doctors did not do it because of difficult access. Differences found for severe acute diseases in CHIPAE scale among foreign and native teenagers resulted to be statistically significant. The most important differences in the CHIP-AE are found between adolescents of different sex. Conclusions: immigrant teenagers of our sample visit more their Primary Care physician. They admit to have less episodes of illness though with worse results in psychological aspects than natives. Among all the factors seen in the study, the one that determines more differences in health is sex.