A comprehensive study by Anglia Ruskin University and the University of Cambridge has found that people with mental illness are significantly more likely to suffer from a variety of physical illnesses, underscoring the need for integrated mental and physical health care.
Mental health is a human right that is critical to individual, community and socioeconomic development and is defined as a state of mental health that enables people to cope with the stresses of life, develop to their best abilities, learn and work well, and contribute to their communities.
Mental health is an integral component of health and well-being and underlies our individual and collective ability to make decisions, build relationships and shape the world we live in. In fact, there is growing evidence that people with mental disorders have higher rates of several chronic physical health conditions, including HIV, diabetes, gastrointestinal disease, cardiovascular disease, and respiratory disease.
The prevalence of physical multimorbidity (defined as any combination of a chronic disease and at least one other disease (acute or chronic)) is expected to increase due to an aging population and an increase in chronic disease risk factors. However, this association is not linear, and poor physical health in people with mental illness is a multifaceted, transdiagnostic and global problem. Thus, differences in physical health are observed across all mental disorders in low-, middle-, and high-income countries.
Poor clinical management of physical comorbidities and multimorbidity in people with mental illness contributes to significantly shortened life expectancy and increases the personal, social, and economic burden of mental illness across the lifespan. In addition, reduced life expectancy in people with mental illness is associated with other factors, such as social and behavioral factors (such as loneliness and reduced physical activity) and socioeconomic status. In fact, people of lower socioeconomic status are more likely to suffer from mental illness and morbidity and have shorter life expectancies. Long-term physical conditions and mental health problems often coexist and work synergistically to negatively impact disability, length of stay, and increased costs and mortality.
People with mental illness are almost twice as likely to suffer from a variety of physical illnesses, new research shows.
A new study from Anglia Ruskin University (ARU) in partnership with the University of Cambridge's Biomedical Research Center has revealed important findings about the physical health of people with psychosis. The extensive analysis included data from 19 different studies involving 194,123 people with psychosis worldwide and compared them with a control group of 7,660,590 people.
Multimorbidity is when a person has a chronic disease and at least one other physical health condition. Researchers found that people with psychosis were 1.84 times more likely than controls to report being multimorbid.
Studies have found that people with serious mental health problems also report physical conditions, including metabolic disease, hypertension, epilepsy, respiratory disease, vascular disease, kidney disease, gastrointestinal disease, and cancer.
As of 2019, nearly 1 billion people worldwide suffer from mental disorders, making them the leading cause of disability. According to Mind, one in four people in England will experience some kind of mental health problem every year.
Previous research has found that a large proportion of people in need of mental health services do not have access to effective, affordable and high-quality mental health services, especially in low-income countries. For example, 71% of people with mental illness globally do not have access to necessary mental health services, and the gap between high-income and low-income countries is very large.
Lead author Lee Smith, professor of public health at Anglia Ruskin University (ARU), UK, said: "Mental health underpins our individual and collective abilities to make decisions, build relationships and shape the world we live in. It is clear from our study that people with severe mental illness are at a much higher risk of developing physical multi-morbidity. This complex link between severe mental illness and physical multi-morbidity The complex relationship has far-reaching consequences, including reduced treatment compliance, increased risk of treatment failure, increased treatment costs, disease relapse, worsened prognosis and shortened life expectancy. Poor clinical management of physical comorbidities in people with mental disorders exacerbates the problem, resulting in increased burden on individuals, communities and health care systems. There is an urgent need for integrated approaches to improve the physical, mental and social status of people with severe mental illness and multi-morbidity."