Long-term trends of potential years of life lost due to main causes of death in the Slovak population, 2004-2013.

Martin Samohyl,Lubica Argalasova,Katarina Hirosova,Jana Jurkovicova

doi:10.1590/0102-311x00052218

Abstract

The aim of this study was to evaluate trends of potential years of life lost (PYLL) rates in the Slovak population and analyze the average annual percent change (AAPC) of PYLL rates regarding the most common causes of death between 2004 and 2013. National mortality and demographic data were obtained from the Statistical Office of the Slovak Republic, and 378,535 causes of death within the period were analyzed. The PYLL values in both genders and each disease category were added up across all age groups to form annual values. For the trend analysis, the AAPC indicator was proposed. The PYLL rate is age-standardized and expressed as a sum of all deaths per 100,000. In the period 2004-2013, the highest mean PYLL rates were observed in neoplasms in the whole population (2,103 per 100,000), as well as in females (2,088 per 100,000), with a permanent high significant increase of AAPC of PYLL in both genders. The second highest mean PYLL rate in the ten-year period was related to circulatory system diseases in total (1,922 per 100,000) as well as in females (1,449 per 100,000). In males, circulatory system diseases had the highest PYLL rate (2,397 per 100,000). The PYLL rates trend regarding external causes of morbidity and mortality showed the most notable decrease in the assessed period and the AAPC of PYLL showed significant negative values both in males (-2.5%; p < 0.001) and females (-4%; p < 0.001). Our results should contribute in developing intervention programs aimed at reducing the burden of premature mortality since the main causes of premature death are associated to well-known and preventable risk factors.

Highlights

Premature mortality is a measure of unfulfilled life expectancy and the premature mortality rate is determined by adding up the potential life lost years of individuals in each country 1
The concept of potential years of life lost (PYLL) involving premature deaths was introduced, which includes the number of deaths resulting from a particular cause, as well as the age at death and allows weighting potentially preventable deaths occurring at younger ages [5,6]
Calculation of the PYLL rate 13 was based on the following equation: where l represents the population’s life expectancy, a is age in one-year intervals, dat is the number of deaths in a certain age group in each causes of death (i) during each year (t), pat is the number of inhabitants in an age group, pa is the number of standard population in a certain age group and pn is the total number of standard population (0-69 years of age)

Summary

Introduction

Premature mortality is a measure of unfulfilled life expectancy and the premature mortality rate is determined by adding up the potential life lost years of individuals in each country 1. In epidemiological research there are different definitions of premature mortality, premature death is defined as death that occurs before the average age of death in a certain population; usually as death before 70 years of age (e.g. in the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development – OECD – countries) 2,3,4. It allows the time trends analysis, but does not include the social and economic burdens of premature deaths imposed on society. It provides a direct assessment of disease-related mortality and allows separating gender and race differences in mortality from selected diseases from the background of gender and race differences in those general populations 7

Objectives

Methods

Results

Discussion

Conclusion