A team of researchers from the University of Oxford (United Kingdom) has carried out a study whose final resolution highlights that serious mental illnesses reduce life expectancy by between 10 and 20 years , just as if they were heavy smokers who smoke 20 cigarettes or most up to date.
For the study, the researchers analyzed twenty reviews of clinical studies (with more than 1.7 million patients treated) on the risk of mortality for a wide range of diagnoses , such as dementia, mental health problems, substance and alcohol abuse, autism spectrum disorders or recurrent depression.
Analysis of the data revealed that the average reduction in life expectancy in people with bipolar disorder was between 9 and 20 years; for drug and alcohol abuse, life expectancy was reduced from 9 to 24 years; for patients with schizophrenia aged 10-20 years; for patients with recurrent depression, life expectancy was reduced between 7 and 11 years. Taking all these data into account, fatal diseases generally posed a risk of loss of life expectancy equivalent to or greater than that of heavy smokers .
“People with mental health problems are among the most vulnerable in society . This paper emphasizes how important your lack of access to health care and advice is. We now have strong evidence that mental illness is as life-threatening as other public health threats, such as smoking, “said John Williams, the study leader.
The work has been published in the journal World Psychiatry .
