Comorbidity of chronic diseases in general practice

Abstract

With the increasing number of elderly people in The Netherlands the prevalence of chronic diseases will rise in the next decades. It is recognized in general practice that many older patients suffer from more than one chronic disease (comorbidity). The aim of this study is to describe the extent of comorbidity for the following diseases: hypertension, chronic ischemic heart disease, diabetes mellitus, chronic nonspecific lung disease, osteoarthritis. In a general practice population of 23,534 persons, 1989 patients have been identified with one or more chronic diseases. Only diseases in agreement with diagnostic criteria were included. In persons of 65 and older 23% suffer from one or more of the chronic diseases under study. Within this group 15% suffer from more than one of the chronic diseases. Osteoarthritis and diabetes mellitus are the diseases with the highest rate of comorbidity. Comorbidity restricts the external validity of results from single-disease intervention studies and complicates the organization of care.

Psychiatric Morbidities in Patients of Copd and Bronchial Asthma Attending Opd of Tertiary Care Hospital

“…This is supported in the study done by Schellevis FG et al 13 with similar findings. A literature review on the prevalence of anxiety in COPD patients reported rates of anxiety ranging from 10% to 40%.…”

Epidemiology and impact of multimorbidity in primary care: a retrospective cohort study

“…[3][4][5] Some studies have been based on surveys or administrative data, or have been restricted to older populations. 6,7 Most studies based on medical records have involved relatively small numbers of practices and/or patients, 3 while larger studies have focused on the determinants and prevalence of multimorbidity, [8][9][10][11][12] but few have related this to process or outcome variables in primary care. 13,14 Earlier research on multimorbidity has been limited by problems with case definition and with the reliability of data recording within routine practice records.…”

Osteoarthritis revisited—again!

“…They include a greater than expected susceptibility to cardio-and cerebrovascular episodes, hypertension and type 2 diabetes mellitus. Patients seeing their general practitioners with OA present a greater number of comorbidities than any other chronic disease [32]. Further, preoperative hip replacement patients are equally unhealthy [33] and the postoperative death rate is disproportionately higher in OA patients [34].…”