Our findings support the hypothesis that cancer patients run greater risks of committing suicide than the general population does. The severity of the cancer increases the suicide risk. More attention to cancer patients' psychological and care situation is called for.

Male achalasia patients have substantially greater risks for both squamous cell carcinoma and adenocarcinoma of the esophagus. Small numbers preclude a firm conclusion about the risk among women.

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In Sweden, an expected growing gap between available resources and greater potential for medical treatment has brought evidence-based guidelines and priority setting into focus. There are problems, however, in areas where the evidence base is weak and underlying ethical values are controversial. Based on a specified definition of multiple-diseased elderly patients, the aims of this study are: (i) to describe and quantify inpatient care utilisation and patient characteristics, particularly regarding cardiovascular disease and co-morbidity; and (ii) to question the applicability of evidence-based guidelines for these patients with regard to the reported characteristics (i.e. age and co-morbidity), and to suggest some possible strategies in order to tackle the described problem and the probable presence of ageism. We used data from three sources: (a) a literature review, (b) a register study, based on a unique population-based register The results show that elderly patients with multiple co-morbidities constitute a large and growing population in Swedish inpatient hospital care. They have multiple and complex needs and a large majority have a cardiovascular disease. There is a relationship between reported characteristics, i.e. age and co-morbidity, and limited applicability of evidence-based guidelines, and this can cause an under-use as well as an over-use of medical interventions. As future clinical studies will be rare due to methodological and financial factors, we consider it necessary to condense existing practical-clinical experiences of individual experts into consensus-based guidelines concerning elderly with multi-morbidity. In such priority setting, it will be important to consider co-morbidity and different degrees of frailty.

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