• Karen M Davison, Yu Lung, Shen Lamson Lin, Hongmei Tong, Karen M Kobayashi, and Esme Fuller-Thomson.
• Kwantlen Polytechnic University, Canada; University of Hawai'i, USA. Electronic address: karen.davison@kpu.ca.
• J Affect Disord. 2020 Mar 15; 265: 526-537.

BackgroundPsychological distress increases mortality risk; there is little knowledge about its prevelance and contributory factors in older populations.MethodsCanadian Longitudinal Study on Aging baseline data (2010-2015) were analyzed to examine the relationship between Kessler's Psychological Distress Scale-K10 and immigrant status (recent/mid-term,<20 years; long-term, ≥20 years; Canadian-born). Covariates included socioeconomic and health-related variables. Stratified by sex, two series of multinomial logistic regression were used to calculate the likelihood of having mild distress (20 < K10 score ≤24) and moderate/severe distress (K10 score >24).ResultsRespondents (n = 25,700) were mainly Canadian-born (82.8%), 45-65 years (59.3%), earning cut-off; OR=1.32, 99% CI 1.02-1.70), and higher nutritional risk (ORs = 2.16-3.31, p's <0.001). For men, psychological distress was associated with under-nutrition (grip strength56 years, ORs=0.19-0.79, p's<0.01), lower income (≤C$149,000, ORs = 1.68-7.79, p's<0.01), multi-morbidities (ORs = 1.67-4.70, p's<0.01), chronic pain (ORs = 1.67-3.09, p's<0.001) and higher intake of chocolate (≥ 0.6 bar/week, ORs=1.61-2.23, p's<0.001).LimitationsCross-sectional design prohibits causal inferences.ConclusionsNutritional factors, immigration status, social, and health-related problems are strongly associated with psychological distress among midlife and older adults.Copyright © 2020. Published by Elsevier B.V.

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