The impact of cardiovascular disease and chronic kidney disease on life expectancy and direct medical cost in a 10-year diabetes cohort study
The relative effects of various cardiovascular diseases (CVD) and varying severity of chronic kidney disease (CKD) on mortality risk, direct medical cost and life expectancy in patients with diabetes mellitus (DM) are unclear. The aim of this study was to evaluate these associations.
Research Design
and Methods
This
was a retrospective cohort study that included 208,792 adults with diabetes
stratified into 12 disease status groups with varying combinations of heart
disease, stroke, moderate CKD (eGFR:30-59ml/min/1.73m2)
and severe CKD
(eGFR: <30ml/min/1.73m2) in 2008-2010. The
effect of risk mortality, annual direct medical costs and life expectancy were
assessed using Cox regression, Gamma generalized
linear with log link function, and flexible parametric survival models.
Results
Over a median follow-up of 8.5 years (1.6 million patient-years), 50,154 deaths were recorded. Mortality risks for patients with only a single condition among heart disease, stroke and moderate CKD were similar. The mortality risks were 1.75 times, 2.63 times and 3.58 times greater for patients with one, two and all three conditions (consisting of stroke, heart disease and moderate CKD), compared with patients without these diseases, suggesting an independent and individually additive effect for any combination. A similar trend was observed in annual public healthcare costs with 2.91, 3.90 and 3.88 fold increased costs for patients with one, two and three conditions, respectively. Increases in the number of conditions reduced life expectancy greatly, particularly in younger patients. Reduction in life expectancy for a 40-year-old with one, two and three conditions were 20, 25, 30 years for men and 25, 30, 35 years for women. A similar trend of greater magnitude was observed for severe CKD.
Conclusion
The effect of heart diseases, stroke, CKD and the combination of these conditions on all-cause mortality and direct medical costs are independent and cumulative. CKD, especially severe CKD, appears to have a particularly significant impact on life expectancy and direct medical costs in patients with diabetes. These finding supports the importance of preventing both CVD and CKD in patients with DM.
