When Chronic Ailments Pile On

One physical disease or mental health condition will frequently spawn or exacerbate others, new research reveals. Here’s how to buffer against the odds.

Image: Tero Vesalainen/Shutterstock. Used under the writer’s license

Anyone with a chronic physical or mental health condition, from physical pain to anxiety or depression, knows the challenges and misery they bring. But more and more in modern society, people develop two or more chronic conditions, called comorbidities. Research in the UK published earlier this year noted that 20–40% of adults have multiple long-term health conditions, as do more than half of people age 65 and older. Rates are thought to be similar in other Western nations.

The problem of multiple maladies has tremendous implications, as the agony and frustration of two or more ailments — whether or not pain is one of them — multiply in 1+1=3 fashion. People die sooner than they otherwise would, and enjoy far lower quality of life along the way.

This story is partly about how to avoid that fate. But first we need to acknowledge what’s going on, as soaring rates of obesity and diabetes and mental health challenges converge to make life so lousy for so many modern humans.

The latest research on the issue was published last week in the Brazilian Journal of Physical…