Reasons for Hospitilization
From The Peopling of Astoria, Queens
This chart shows the reasons for hospitalization according to the age of
residents of Astoria, Queens in 2000.
As we can see in this chart, the primary reason for hospitalization of
children ages 9 or younger is asthma. When I researched on why this may be,
I found out the younger children are more affected by pollution than are
older people. This is because at that age, child's lungs aren't completely
developed and thus they are more susceptible to pollution than are people
of other age groups. In addition, because Astoria is high in population,
that also is a very strong reasno for why there is high pollution in that area.
For ages 10-64, we can see that the two highest reasons for hospitalization
are Pregnancy related issues and mental disorders. When it comes to
pregnancy, we also have to take into account the sexually transmitted
diseases, and as Ms. Rubenstein mentioned, STD's are widespread in Astoria,
as well as the rest of the city. Thus, we can conclude that many of these
pregnancy related issues have to do with STD's and this is a result of the
lack of the practice of safe sex in the neighborhood. As far as the mental
issues are concerned, national statistics show that while 7.3% of the
American Adult population has an anxiety related disorder that needs to be
treated, 2-5% of people suffer from the affects of clinical depression.
Thus, we can infer that Astoria isn't too different from other areas in
America as far as health issues are concerned for these ages. High levels
of pregnancy and health related issues exist throughout the nation.
For ages 65 and over, the top two health issues are heart related. This
statistic also doesn't come as a great surprise because 35% of women and
30% of men all over the nation have a disease or disorder that is heart
related.
Thus, we can conclude that the health issues that exist in Astoria aren't
very different from the health issues that exist around the nation.