Housing improvements and health

Despite long-established associations between housing conditions and health, the evidence linking housing improvements to changes in health outcomes is still sparse. Our latest briefing paper, Health Effects of Housing Improvements, reports on changes in physical and mental health outcomes related to housing improvements undertaken in social housing Glasgow since 2003 as part of investment agreed as part of the stock transfer to bring stock up to the Scottish Housing Quality Standard (SHQS).

The objective of the research was to establish whether there were any differences in the change in physical and mental health outcomes over time between those who did or did not receive four different types of housing improvements.

The briefing paper looks at the effects of each of four housing improvements on physical and mental health. It also examines the effects of multiple improvements and of time since the improvements in order to investigate whether the effects change over time.

Our findings relating the health improvements following housing improvements are modest. However, while housing improvements may not lead manifest improvements in individual health over the short term but improved and maintained housing stock should lead to longer term health improvements at the population level.

Although housing providers improve homes with the expectation of health gains they also aim to improve residential satisfaction and quality of life more generally. Our study highlights the central importance of employment to the health of residents in deprived areas, and supports a case for more attention to be paid to employment as part of regeneration, whether through economic, employability or health-improvement measures.