Impact of Socioeconomic Inequalities in Transition Between Health, Multimorbidity and Death Amongst Older People

The association between social inequality and cause-specific mortality and single disease morbidity has been studied extensively. However, it remains unclear whether having two or more chronic diseases concurrently (or 'multimorbidity') plays a role in contributing to the inequalities gap in survival. This is particularly relevant given an ageing population and the trend of a widening in the life expectancy gap across several European countries.

Multimorbidity incidence increases rapidly with age. Estimates of the prevalence of multimorbidity in older people range from 55% to 98%, mainly due to the selection of diseases included, population coverage (hospital, community) and data source (self-reported surveys or clinical records). However, across all studies there is a clear and consistent pattern of higher prevalence rates at older ages, with multimorbidity.

Many aspects of the patient health trajectory remain under-explored. Patient case-mixes are likely to vary across socioeconomic groups, alongside a host of prognostic factors, including the clustering of multiple risk factors, age of onset, and disease presentation, progression and management in the presence of multiple health conditions.