The Global Burden of Disease (GBD) 2010 Study has published disability-adjusted life year (DALY) data at both regional and country levels from 1990 to 2010. Concurrently, the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation (IHME) has published estimates of development assistance for health (DAH) at the country-disease level for this same period of time.
The Arab world has a set of historical, geopolitical, social, cultural, and economic characteristics and has been involved in several wars that have affected the burden of disease. Moreover, financial and human resources vary widely across the region. We aimed to examine the burden of diseases and injuries in the Arab world for 1990, 2005, and 2010 using data from the Global Burden of Diseases, Injuries, and Risk Factors Study 2010 (GBD 2010).
Monitoring progress with disease and injury reduction in many populations will require widespread use of verbal autopsy (VA). Multiple methods have been developed for assigning cause of death from a VA but their application is restricted by uncertainty about their reliability.
Tobacco is a leading global disease risk factor. Understanding national trends in prevalence and consumption is critical for prioritizing action and evaluating tobacco control progress.
Sodium intakes exceed the recommended levels in almost all countries with small differences by age and sex. Virtually all populations would benefit from sodium reduction, supported by enhanced surveillance.
Research assessing the relationship between government health expenditure and development assistance for health channeled to governments (DAHG) has not considered that this relationship may depend on whether DAHG is increasing or decreasing. We explore this issue using general method of moments estimation and a panel of financial flows data spanning 119 countries and 16 years.
The objectives of this study were to provide an accurate estimate of antenatal HIV screening and its determinants among pregnant women in El Salvador and help local authorities make informed decisions for targeted interventions around mother-to-child transmission (MTCT).
Lu et al. found that health aid displaces domestically-raised government health expenditure, which renders health aid at least partially fungible. These findings are questioned in The Fungibility of Health Aid Reconsidered. Van de Sijpe’s emphasis on disaggregating on- and off-budget aid is a valid contribution, although his empirical conclusions are overstated.
We used data from the Global Burden of Diseases, Injuries, and Risk Factors Study 2010 (GBD 2010) to estimate the burden of disease attributable to mental and substance use disorders in terms of disability-adjusted life years (DALYs), years of life lost to premature mortality (YLLs), and years lived with disability (YLDs).
Depressive disorders were a leading cause of burden in the Global Burden of Disease (GBD) 1990 and 2000 studies. Here, we analyze the burden of depressive disorders in GBD 2010 and present severity proportions, burden by country, region, age, sex, and year, as well as burden of depressive disorders as a risk factor for suicide and ischemic heart disease.
We used data from the Global Burden of Diseases, Injuries, and Risk Factors Study 2010 (GBD 2010) to estimate the global and regional burden of first-ever ischaemic and haemorrhagic stroke during 1990—2010.
Previous estimates of mortality in Iraq attributable to the 2003 invasion have been heterogeneous and controversial, and none were produced after 2006. The purpose of this research was to estimate direct and indirect deaths attributable to the war in Iraq between 2003 and 2011.
Previous studies of anemia epidemiology have been geographically limited with little detail about severity or etiology. Using publicly available data, we estimated mild, moderate and severe anemia from 1990 to 2010 for 187 countries, both sexes, and 20 age groups. We then performed cause-specific attribution to 17 conditions using data and resources from the Global Burden of Diseases, Injuries and Risk Factors (GBD) 2010 Study.
Rates of neonatal and maternal mortality are high in Ghana. In-facility delivery and other maternal services could reduce this burden, yet utilization rates of key maternal services are relatively low, especially in rural areas. We tested a theoretical implication that travel time negatively affects the use of in-facility delivery and other maternal services.
No systematic attempts have been made to estimate the global and regional prevalence of amphetamine, cannabis, cocaine, and opioid dependence, and quantify their burden. We aimed to assess the prevalence and burden of drug dependence, as measured in years of life lived with disability (YLDs), years of life lost (YLLs), and disability-adjusted life years (DALYs).
Over the last 30 years, HIV/AIDS has emerged as a major global health challenge. Globally, the trend is that non-communicable diseases and injuries are accounting for a larger share of disease burden, but HIV/AIDS is a notable exception. Maintaining and expanding the response to the epidemic will require assessment of its magnitude and impact at the country level. It is also critical to examine the HIV/AIDS epidemic in the context of other health problems to clearly understand its impact and effectively allocate resources.
In 2012, data from GBD 2010 were published, providing results for 1990, 2005, and 2010. Hundreds of collaborators reported summary results for the world and 21 epidemiologic regions, covering 291 diseases and injuries, 1,160 sequelae of these causes, and mortality and burden attributable to 67 risk factors. GBD 2010 addressed a number of major limitations to previous analyses, including strengthening the statistical methods used for estimation and using disability weights derived from surveys of the general population. Metrics produced include leading causes of death, years of life lost, years lived with disability, and disability-adjusted life years (DALYs), which are the years of healthy life lost by a person due to death or disability.
Under-5 mortality, the probability of death before age 5, is an important indicator of child health in a population. Because estimates of under-5 mortality are often derived from birth history data from censuses or surveys, it is important to know how accurate these estimates are, particularly estimates derived from small samples of women. Researchers aimed to assess the magnitude and direction of error for estimates derived from birth histories using several analysis methods.
HIV prevalence over time is a critical metric for understanding the effectiveness of programs aiming to prevent HIV. Prevalence is often measured using surveillance of clinic patients, which can lead to selection bias: clinics located in areas of high HIV prevalence are often the first to be monitored by the surveillance systems, distorting the estimated HIV prevalence based on clinic data. To help understand the impact of selection bias on the estimation of HIV prevalence trends, researchers compared the efficacy of two approaches for handling selection bias.
The United States spends more than any other country on health care, but US life expectancy at birth ranked 40th for males and 39th for females globally in 2010. To help understand this poor national performance, as well as the large disparities seen in life expectancy across communities, researchers estimated age-specific mortality rates for males and females by US county from 1985 to 2010.
Obesity and lack of physical activity are associated with several chronic conditions, such as heart disease and diabetes, increased health care costs, and premature death. Since different local governments have pursued different approaches to address both risks, levels of obesity and physical activity are likely to vary substantially across counties. To understand local trends in physical activity and obesity that would help identify successful and less successful strategies, researchers examined county-level changes in physical activity and obesity between 2001 and 2011.
To better inform national health policy, it is critical to understand the major health problems in the United States and how they are changing over time. Using data from the Global Burden of Diseases, Injuries, and Risk Factors Study 2010 (GBD 2010), researchers compared health outcomes in the US with those of the 34 countries in the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD).
Violence against women is a phenomenon that persists in all countries. However, documenting the magnitude of violence against women and producing reliable comparative data to guide policy and monitor progress has been difficult.
An estimated 6% of global infant deaths are attributable to congenital anomalies, of which 92% occur in low-income and middle-income countries (LMICs). Some of the conditions can be treated by specialized surgical procedures that have been frequently provided through established vertical programs. This study aims to quantify the burden of congenital anomalies in LMICs that could be averted should the surgical programs be scaled up to 100% coverage.
