[Weight, general health and mental health: status of diverse subgroups of immigrants in Canada]

BACKGROUND: Recent immigrants to Canada tend to be healthier than the non-immigrant population. Less is known about the health of different ethnic, cultural, and linguistic subgroups of immigrants in Canada. METHODS: Data were taken from the 2005 Canadian Community Health Survey (Cycle 3.1). We used multiple logistic regression to examine associations for three immigrant characteristics (1-time since immigration, 2-visible minority status, 3-knowledge of an official language) and three health outcomes (1-self-rated general health, 2-self-rated mental health, 3-body mass index (BMI)) for Montreal, Toronto, and Vancouver, accounting for socio-demographic characteristics. RESULTS: Recent immigrants belonging to a visible minority have a lower likelihood of reporting poor general (OR 0.72, 95% CI 0.54-0.97) and mental (OR 0.64, 95% CI 0.43-0.96) health and BMI > or = 25 (OR 0.51, 95% CI 0.43-0.61) relative to non-immigrants. These associations were not present for recent immigrants not belonging to a visible minority. Immigrants who cannot converse in an official language have a higher likelihood of reporting poor general health (OR 1.49, 95% CI 1.06-2.10) relative to non-immigrants. In Toronto and Vancouver (but not Montreal), immigrants were less likely to have an elevated BMI. CONCLUSION: This study supports a healthy immigrant effect in Canada. However, the healthy immigrant effect is only present in certain subgroups of immigrants. These findings are important for the planning of health services targeting immigrants.