Canada has an increasingly large immigrant population. Areas of higher immigrant density, may relate to immigrants’ health through reduced acculturation to Western foods, greater access to cultural foods, and/or promotion of salubrious values/practices. It is unclear, however, whether an association exists between Canada-wide regional immigrant density and obesity among immigrants. Thus, we examined whether regional immigrant density was related to obesity, among immigrants. Adult immigrant respondents (n = 15,595) to a national population-level health survey were merged with region-level immigrant density data. Multi-level logistic regression was used to model the odds of obesity associated with increased immigrant density. The prevalence of obesity among the analytic sample was 16%. Increasing regional immigrant density was associated with lower odds of obesity among minority immigrants and long-term white immigrants. Immigrant density at the region-level in Canada may be an important contextual factor to consider when examining obesity among immigrants. © 2017, Springer Science+Business Media, LLC, part of Springer Nature.

Immigrant density Canada Obesity immigrants

demography human epidemiology middle aged statistics and numerical data obesity time factor Time Factors Health Surveys ethnology Residence Characteristics Young Adult Humans migrant Adolescent male Canada Emigrants and Immigrants Acculturation Socioeconomic Factors female socioeconomics cultural factor prevalence adult age sex factor Sex Factors Age Factors body mass Body Mass Index health survey