Comorbidity profile of poliomyelitis survivors in a Chinese population: a population-based study

Abstract

Previous reports of comorbid conditions in poliomyelitis survivors mainly focused on some disease categories, such as respiratory diseases, gastrointestinal diseases, psychiatric diseases, neurological diseases and cancer. Data regarding a wide spectrum of medical comorbidities in patients with poliomyelitis is still sparse. This study aimed to investigate and profile the wide range of comorbidities among the survivors of paralytic poliomyelitis in a Chinese population. In total, 2,032 paralytic poliomyelitis patients were selected as the study group and the comparison group consisted of 10,160 randomly selected enrollees. The comorbidities for analysis were based on a modified version of the Elixhauser Comorbidity Index. Conditional logistic regression analyses were computed to investigate the risk of comorbidities for these two groups. As compared to controls, patients with paralytic poliomyelitis had significantly higher prevalence of hypertension, ischemic heart disease, hyperlipidemia, congestive heart failure, cardiac arrhythmias, peripheral vascular disorder, stroke, paralysis, migraines, Parkinson's disease, rheumatoid arthritis, ankylosing spondylitis, pulmonary circulation disorders, chronic pulmonary disease, liver disease, peptic ulcers, hepatitis B or C, deficiency anemias, depression, and lymphoma. Most of the differences are of clinical interest, ORs often being between 2 and 3. No significant difference between poliomyelitis patients and controls was observed in the prevalence of SLE, tuberculosis, alcohol abuse and drug abuse. Our findings demonstrate that survivors of paralytic poliomyelitis in Taiwan are at higher risk of having multiple medical comorbidities although some potential confounding factors including educational level, marital status, obesity and physical activity are not available in our database. The pattern is generally consistent with previous observations from Western populations. Nevertheless, we found several novel associations which have rarely, if ever, been reported previously.

Adjunctive traditional Chinese medicine therapy improves survival in patients with advanced breast cancer: A population‐based study

“…The baseline demographic variables of the patients were obtained from the registry for beneficiary files, and patient age was determined according to the index date. The baseline comorbidities were determined using the modified version of the Elixhauser comorbidity index according to the patient medical records 2 years before the index date. These comorbidities include hypertension, diabetes mellitus, congestive heart failure, stroke, chronic pulmonary disease, and liver disease.…”

Post-Polio Syndrome and Risk Factors in Korean Polio Survivors: A Baseline Survey by Telephone Interview

“…The symptoms of PPS could be severe enough to impair the overall quality of life, significantly deteriorate work-related function, and impose lifestyle changes [5]. Additionally, polio survivors might be at high risk of having multiple medical comorbidities and falling [9,10,11,12]. Although the prevalence of PPS was reported to be in a varying range, it is definitely a common neurological disorder that occurs in a large proportion of polio survivors [13,14,15].…”

Morbidity and mortality following poliomyelitis – a lifelong follow‐up

“…It is therefore surprising to find that morbidity and mortality are also increased for non‐paralytic cases. Apart from our cohort only one case‐control study of morbidity among paralytic PM survivors has been reported ; it also showed a substantial increased morbidity of paralytic PM survivors.…”