ArticleBMJ open2020
Has working-age morbidity been declining? Changes over time in survey measures of general health, chronic diseases, symptoms and biomarkers in England 1994-2014.
Article in BMJ open, 2020. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. An erratum has been issued. Cited by 3 papers.
What it found
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The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
3 citing papers in PubMed, 9 citations in OpenAlex.
- Diverging trends in health at older ages in England, 2004-2024: evidence from the English Longitudinal Study of Ageing.medRxiv : the preprint server for health sciences · 2026Article
- Has multimorbidity and frailty in adult hospital admissions changed over the last 15 years? A retrospective study of 107 million admissions in England.BMC medicine · 2024Article
- Trajectories of middle-aged and elderly people's chronic diseases Disability Adjusted Life Years (DALYs): cohort, socio-economic status and gender disparities.International journal for equity in health · 2021Article
Corrections and comments
- Erratum issued
Authors and funding
1 author at 1 institution in 1 country.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
objectivesAs life expectancy has increased in high-income countries, there has been a global debate about whether additional years of life are free from ill-health/disability. However, little attention has been given to changes over time in morbidity in the DESIGN, SETTING AND
participantsWe use a high-quality annual cross-sectional survey, the Health Survey for England (HSE) 1994-2014. HSE uses a random sample of the English household population, with a combined sample size of over 140 000 people. We produce a newly harmonised version of HSE that maximises comparability over time, including new non-response weights. While HSE is used for monitoring population health, it has hitherto not used for investigating morbidity as a whole. OUTCOME MEASURES: We analyse all 39 measures that are fully comparable over time-including chronic disease diagnoses, symptomatology and a number of biomarkers-adjusting for gender and age.
resultsWe find a mixed picture: we see improving cardiovascular and respiratory health, but deteriorations in obesity, diabetes, some biomarkers and feelings of extreme anxiety/depression, alongside stability in moderate mental ill-health and musculoskeletal-related health. In several domains we also see stable or rising chronic disease
conclusionsDespite considerable falls in working-age mortality-and the assumptions of many policy-makers that morbidity will follow mortality - there is no systematic improvement in overall working-age morbidity in England from 1994 to 2014.
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Registered trials
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