Multimorbidity and the inequalities of global ageing: a cross-sectional study of 28 countries using the World Health Surveys

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Abstract

Background

Multimorbidity defined as the “the coexistence of two or more chronic diseases” in one individual, is increasing in prevalence globally. The aim of this study is to compare the prevalence of multimorbidity across low and middle-income countries (LMICs), and to investigate patterns by age and education, as a proxy for socio-economic status (SES).

Methods

Chronic disease data from 28 countries of the World Health Survey (2003) were extracted and inter-country socio-economic differences were examined by gross domestic product (GDP). Regression analyses were applied to examine associations of education with multimorbidity by region adjusted for age and sex distributions.

Results

The mean world standardized multimorbidity prevalence for LMICs was 7.8 % (95 % CI, 7.79 % - 7.83 %). In all countries, multimorbidity increased significantly with age. A positive but non–linear relationship was found between country GDP and multimorbidity prevalence. Trend analyses of multimorbidity by education suggest that there are intergenerational differences, with a more inverse education gradient for younger adults compared to older adults. Higher education was significantly associated with a decreased risk of multimorbidity in the all-region analyses.

Conclusions

Multimorbidity is a global phenomenon, not just affecting older adults in HICs. Policy makers worldwide need to address these health inequalities, and support the complex service needs of a growing multimorbid population.

Electronic supplementary material

The online version of this article (doi:10.1186/s12889-015-2008-7) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.

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Most cited references 59

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A comparative risk assessment of burden of disease and injury attributable to 67 risk factors and risk factor clusters in 21 regions, 1990–2010: a systematic analysis for the Global Burden of Disease Study 2010

Stephen S Lim, Theo Vos, Abraham D. Flaxman … (2012)

The Lancet, 380(9859), 2224-2260

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Epidemiology of multimorbidity and implications for health care, research, and medical education: a cross-sectional study.

Karen Barnett, Stewart Mercer, Michael Norbury … (2012)

Long-term disorders are the main challenge facing health-care systems worldwide, but health systems are largely configured for individual diseases rather than multimorbidity. We examined the distribution of multimorbidity, and of comorbidity of physical and mental health disorders, in relation to age and socioeconomic deprivation. In a cross-sectional study we extracted data on 40 morbidities from a database of 1,751,841 people registered with 314 medical practices in Scotland as of March, 2007. We analysed the data according to the number of morbidities, disorder type (physical or mental), sex, age, and socioeconomic status. We defined multimorbidity as the presence of two or more disorders. 42·2% (95% CI 42·1-42·3) of all patients had one or more morbidities, and 23·2% (23·08-23·21) were multimorbid. Although the prevalence of multimorbidity increased substantially with age and was present in most people aged 65 years and older, the absolute number of people with multimorbidity was higher in those younger than 65 years (210,500 vs 194,996). Onset of multimorbidity occurred 10-15 years earlier in people living in the most deprived areas compared with the most affluent, with socioeconomic deprivation particularly associated with multimorbidity that included mental health disorders (prevalence of both physical and mental health disorder 11·0%, 95% CI 10·9-11·2% in most deprived area vs 5·9%, 5·8%-6·0% in least deprived). The presence of a mental health disorder increased as the number of physical morbidities increased (adjusted odds ratio 6·74, 95% CI 6·59-6·90 for five or more disorders vs 1·95, 1·93-1·98 for one disorder), and was much greater in more deprived than in less deprived people (2·28, 2·21-2·32 vs 1·08, 1·05-1·11). Our findings challenge the single-disease framework by which most health care, medical research, and medical education is configured. A complementary strategy is needed, supporting generalist clinicians to provide personalised, comprehensive continuity of care, especially in socioeconomically deprived areas. Scottish Government Chief Scientist Office. Copyright © 2012 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

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Depression, chronic diseases, and decrements in health: results from the World Health Surveys

Saba Moussavi, Somnath Chatterji, Emese Verdes … (2007)

Depression is an important public-health problem, and one of the leading causes of disease burden worldwide. Depression is often comorbid with other chronic diseases and can worsen their associated health outcomes. Few studies have explored the effect of depression, alone or as a comorbidity, on overall health status. The WHO World Health Survey (WHS) studied adults aged 18 years and older to obtain data for health, health-related outcomes, and their determinants. Prevalence of depression in respondents based on ICD-10 criteria was estimated. Prevalence values for four chronic physical diseases--angina, arthritis, asthma, and diabetes--were also estimated using algorithms derived via a Diagnostic Item Probability Study. Mean health scores were constructed using factor analysis and compared across different disease states and demographic variables. The relation of these disease states to mean health scores was determined through regression modelling. Observations were available for 245 404 participants from 60 countries in all regions of the world. Overall, 1-year prevalence for ICD-10 depressive episode alone was 3.2% (95% CI 3.0-3.5); for angina 4.5% (4.3-4.8); for arthritis 4.1% (3.8-4.3); for asthma 3.3% (2.9-3.6); and for diabetes 2.0% (1.8-2.2). An average of between 9.3% and 23.0% of participants with one or more chronic physical disease had comorbid depression. This result was significantly higher than the likelihood of having depression in the absence of a chronic physical disease (p<0.0001). After adjustment for socioeconomic factors and health conditions, depression had the largest effect on worsening mean health scores compared with the other chronic conditions. Consistently across countries and different demographic characteristics, respondents with depression comorbid with one or more chronic diseases had the worst health scores of all the disease states. Depression produces the greatest decrement in health compared with the chronic diseases angina, arthritis, asthma, and diabetes. The comorbid state of depression incrementally worsens health compared with depression alone, with any of the chronic diseases alone, and with any combination of chronic diseases without depression. These results indicate the urgency of addressing depression as a public-health priority to reduce disease burden and disability, and to improve the overall health of populations.

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Author and article information

Contributors

Sara Afshar: sa2706@soton.ac.uk

Paul J. Roderick: pjr@soton.ac.uk

Paul Kowal: kowalp@who.int

Borislav D. Dimitrov: b.dimitrov@soton.ac.uk

Allan G. Hill: ah4e10@soton.ac.uk

Journal

Journal ID (nlm-ta): BMC Public Health

Journal ID (iso-abbrev): BMC Public Health

Title: BMC Public Health

Publisher: BioMed Central (London )

ISSN (Electronic): 1471-2458

Publication date (Electronic): 13 August 2015

Publication date PMC-release: 13 August 2015

Publication date Collection: 2015

Volume: 15

Electronic Location Identifier: 776

Affiliations

[ ]Academic Unit of Primary Care and Population Sciences, Faculty of Medicine, University of Southampton, Southampton General Hospital, Tremona Road, Southampton, SO16 6YD UK

[ ]University of Newcastle Research Centre for Gender, Health and Ageing, Newcastle, NSW Australia

[ ]World Health Organization’s Study on global AGEing and adult health (SAGE), Geneva, Switzerland

[ ]Academic Unit of Social Statistics and Demography, Faculty of Social and Human Sciences, University of Southampton, Southampton, UK

Article

Publisher ID: 2008

DOI: 10.1186/s12889-015-2008-7

PMC ID: 4534141

PubMed ID: 26268536

SO-VID: 7afe4436-b58c-4ed9-ae80-4cff3256a082

License:

Open Access This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License ( http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license, and indicate if changes were made. The Creative Commons Public Domain Dedication waiver ( http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/) applies to the data made available in this article, unless otherwise stated.

History

Date received : 13 March 2015

Date accepted : 1 July 2015

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ScienceOpen disciplines: Public health

Keywords: multimorbidity,ageing,health inequalities,epidemiological transition,adult health

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ScienceOpen disciplines: Public health

Keywords: multimorbidity, ageing, health inequalities, epidemiological transition, adult health

Multimorbidity and the inequalities of global ageing: a cross-sectional study of 28 countries using the World Health Surveys

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Most cited references 59

A comparative risk assessment of burden of disease and injury attributable to 67 risk factors and risk factor clusters in 21 regions, 1990–2010: a systematic analysis for the Global Burden of Disease Study 2010

Epidemiology of multimorbidity and implications for health care, research, and medical education: a cross-sectional study.

Depression, chronic diseases, and decrements in health: results from the World Health Surveys

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