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Male entrepreneurs are the beneficiaries of the overwhelming majority of venture capital investments. But are their ideas really better investment opportunities for VCs than those pitched by women? According to our research, the answer is “not necessarily.” In a two-part study, we observed that venture capitalists adopt markedly different stereotypical notions of female and male entrepreneurs during their decision-making processes. These stereotypical notions, which cast men as having traits better suited to starting successful companies, don’t hold up when compared with venture performance data from annual reports. In other words, there is no statistical evidence that a host of myths about female entrepreneurs is true.

In 2017, we launched a research project in order to learn more about the effects of banks’ lending model transformations. We targeted a random sample of Swedish entrepreneurs (both men and women) who were applying for bank financing.Our results show that women face increased difficulty in accessing bank financing, and specifically that women’s entrepreneurship suffers heavily from the recent transformation among banks. In short, women entrepreneurs showed more of a need to engage in informal economic activities than men.

Objectives To illuminate patterns observed in International Cancer Benchmarking Programme studies by extending understanding of the various influences on presentation and referral with cancer symptoms. Design Cross-country comparison of Denmark, England, and Sweden with qualitative analysis of in-depth interview accounts of the pre-diagnostic process in lung or bowel cancer. Participants 155 women and men, aged between 35 and 86 years old, diagnosed with lung or bowel cancer in the six months before interview. Setting Participants recruited through primary and secondary care, social media, and word-of-mouth. Interviews collected by social scientists or nurse researchers during 2015, mainly in participants’ homes. Results Participants reported difficulties in interpreting diffuse bodily sensations and symptoms and deciding when to consult. There were examples of swift referrals by primary care professionals in all three countries. In all countries participants described difficulty deciding if and when to consult, highlighting concerns about access to GP appointments and overstretched primary care services, although this appears less prominent in the Swedish data. It was not unusual for there to be more than one consultation before referral and we noted two distinct patterns of repeated consultation: (1) Situations where the participant left the primary care consultation with a plan of action about what should happen next. (2) Participants were unclear about under which conditions to return to the doctors. This second pattern sometimes extended over many weeks during which patients described uncertainty, and sometimes frustration, about if and when they should return and whether there were any other feasible investigations. The latter pattern appeared more evident in the interviews in England and Denmark than Sweden. Conclusion We suggest that if clear action plans, as part of safety netting, were routinely used in primary care consultations then uncertainty, false reassurance, and the inefficiency and distress of multiple consultations could be reduced.

Study objective: To examine whether neighbourhood deprivation predicts incidence rates of coronary heart disease, beyond age and individual income. Design: Follow up study from 31 December 1995 to 31 December 1999. Women and men were analysed separately with respect to incidence rates of coronary heart disease. Multilevel logistic regression was used in the analysis with individual level characteristics (age, individual income) at the first level and level of neighbourhood deprivation at the second level. Neighbourhood deprivation was measured at small area market statistics level by the use of Care Need Index. Setting: Sweden. Participants: All women and men aged 40–64 in the Swedish population, in total 2.6 million people. Main results: There was a strong relation between level of neighbourhood deprivation and incidence rates of coronary heart disease for both women and men. In the full model, which took account of individual income, the risk of developing coronary heart disease was 87% higher for women and 42% higher for men in the most deprived neighbourhoods than in the most affluent neighbourhoods. For both women and men the variance at neighbourhood level was over twice the standard error, indicating significant differences in coronary heart disease risk between neighbourhoods. Conclusions: High levels of neighbourhood deprivation independently predict coronary heart disease for both women and men. Both individual and neighbourhood level approaches are important in health care policies.

Study objective: This study examines whether morbidity, defined as the first psychiatric hospital admission and the first somatic hospital admission, differs among subgroups of foreign born and second generation (that is, native born with at least one parent born abroad) women compared with Swedish born women (that is, with both parents native born) after adjusting for sociodemographic factors. Design Setting: In this follow up study the population consisted of 1 452 944 women, of whom 369 771 have an immigrant background (including second generation immigrants), aged 20–45 years. The population of 31 December 1993 was followed up to 31 December 1998. Differences in risk (hazard ratio) between different groups of immigrant women were estimated, adjusting for age, marital status, number of children, and disposable income. Main results: All four groups of foreign born women had higher age adjusted risks (HRs varied from 1.44 to 1.67) for a first psychiatric hospital admission than Swedish born women. The risk decreased only marginally when the sociodemographic factors were taken into consideration. Additionally, second generation women also had a higher age adjusted risk (HR = 1.42; CI = 1.37 to 1.48) than Swedish born women. The risk decreased only slightly in the main effect model. However, on analysing country of birth and first somatic hospital admissions, only non-European refugee women showed an increased age adjusted risk (HR = 1.26; CI = 1.24 to 1.29), which remained after adjusting for sociodemographic factors. Conclusions: Foreign born and second generation women of childbearing age had a higher risk than Swedish born women for a first psychiatric hospital admission. However, only non-European refugees were at higher risk of somatic hospital admissions.

BACKGROUND: Although it is well known that analgesics contribute to suicide, there is little knowledge about how much of the mortality and suicide can be explained by socioeconomic deprivation or by sales of analgesics. METHODS: This ecological study analyses the relationships between the sales (defined daily doses per 1000 inhabitants per day) of dextropropoxyphene, dextropropoxyphene combinations, paracetamol, codeine and paracetamol combinations, and other codeine combinations and the Swedish UPA (underprivileged area) score, mortality and suicide rates in 33 municipalities in Skane in 1987 and 1994 for people aged 20-64 years. The association of each of the subgroups of analgesics with all-cause mortality, and with standardised mortality rates for suicide, adjusted for UPA score, was investigated by using weighted (by population size) regression analysis. RESULTS: In 1994 there was a moderate to strong significant correlation between sales of analgesics and UPA scores, mortality and suicide (r = 0.49-0.78). Although UPA score explained 68.9% and 67.4% respectively of the variance between the analgesics and all-cause mortality and suicide, codeine and paracetamol combinations explained a further 10.1% of the variance in suicide. Dextropropoxyphene and codeine and paracetamol combinations explained an additional 3.8% and 2.9% respectively of the variance in mortality. CONCLUSIONS: Local prescription rates for analgesics were associated with mortality and suicide, when adjusted for socioeconomic deprivation defined as UPA score. (Less)

Study objective: To demonstrate how Care Need Index (CNI), a social deprivation index, may be used to allocate total primary health care resources. Design: Cross sectional survey and register data. The CNI was based on sociodemographic factors: elderly persons living alone, children under age 5, unemployed people, people with low educational status, single parents, high mobility, and foreign born people. The CNI weights were calculated from the ratings of Swedish GPs of the impact of these factors on their workload. The CNI scale was transformed into a positive scale to avoid negative values. CNI weights were calculated for each decile of the study population. The risk of poor self reported health in the CNI deciles was estimated by means of a hierarchical logistic regression in the age range 25–74 (n=27 346). The MigMed database comprising all people living in Sweden was used to calculate the CNI for Stockholm. Participants: The Swedish population and the population in Stockholm County. Main results: The means of the CNI for deciles ranged from 61 (most affluent neighbourhoods) to 140 (most deprived) in Stockholm County. The ratio between the tenth and the first decile was 1.66. There was an approximately 150% increased risk of poor self reported health for people living in the most disadvantaged neighbourhoods (OR=2.50) compared with those living in the most affluent ones (OR=1). CNI ratios for the deciles corresponded approximately to the odds ratios of poor self reported health status. Conclusions: The CNI can be used to allocate total primary health care resources.

Objective: Although all-cause mortality and coronary heart disease (CHD) mortality is declining in Sweden, as in most other countries in the industrialised world, we have limited information about the distribution and trends of mortality in deprived and affluent neighbourhoods. Design: This study analyses the extent to which the decline in all-cause mortality and CHD mortality (over the age range 25–74 y) differs between affluent and deprived neighbourhoods during the decade 1984–1993. Incidence density ratios (IDR), estimated by Poisson regression, were calculated for small areas, grouped into population deciles, by both the care need index (CNI) and the Townsend deprivation score. On average, there were about 14 500 residents and 560 deaths in each decile over the period. Setting: A large Swedish city. Main outcome measures: All-cause mortality and mortality from CHD. Results: The most deprived neighbourhoods had the highest IDR for all-cause mortality and CHD mortality. Over the period from 1984–1988 to 1989–1993 there was an overall decrease in all-cause mortality and CHD mortality, which was significantly higher in the most affluent areas. The mortality ratios for the most deprived neighbourhoods were almost three times higher than those of the most affluent areas. Conclusions: People liviing in more affluent neighbourhoods have had the benefit of most of the last decade's decline in CHD mortality.

OBJECTIVES: This study examined whether neighborhood socioeconomic environment helps to explain the proportion of community members with self-reported poor health status. METHODS: A random sample of 9240 persons aged 25 to 74 years were interviewed during 1988 and 1989. The socioeconomic environment of each respondent's neighborhood was measured with the Care Need Index (CNI) and the Townsend score. The data were analyzed with a multilevel model adjusted for the independent variables. The second-level variables were the 2 neighborhood scores. RESULTS: There was a clear gradient for poor health and education within every CNI interval so that with an increasing CNI (indicating more deprivation), the prevalence of poor health increased in all 3 education groups (P = .001). In the full model, decreasing educational level, obesity, length and frequency of smoking, physical inactivity, and increasing CNI were associated with poor health. Persons living in the most deprived neighborhoods had a prevalence ratio of 1.69 (95% confidence interval = 1.44, 1.98) for poor health compared with those living in the most affluent areas. CONCLUSIONS: Both neighborhood socioeconomic environment and individual educational status are associated with self-reported poor health.