‘Silent epidemic’: Direct mental health costs of PCOS exceed $6B annually in US
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ATLANTA — The annual economic burden of mental health disorders associated with polycystic ovary syndrome was estimated to be more than $6 billion, according to a meta-analysis presented here.
“Polycystic ovary syndrome is the single most common endocrine abnormality in women of reproductive age,” study author Ricardo Azziz, MD, MPH, MBA, executive vice president of operations and chief science and strategy officer at the Lundquist Institute in Torrance, California, told Healio. “It's the single most common cause of infertility; it's the most common risk factor for diabetes other than family history and obesity. So, it's a very important disorder. Many of these women do suffer from mental health disorders, which is underrecognized, both in their impact on the patient as well as their economic impact.”
Azziz and colleagues systematically reviewed databases through July 16, 2021, for original, peer-reviewed, case-control studies on mental health disorders in people with PCOS. The researchers determined the association between PCOS and anxiety, depression and eating disorders in 24 eligible studies, then calculated the excess direct costs of mental health disorders in women with PCOS.
Compared with women who did not have PCOS, those who did had higher odds of anxiety (pooled OR = 1.65; 95% CI, 1.15-2.38), depression (pooled OR = 2.2; 95% CI, 1.69-2.86) and eating disorders (pooled OR = 2.53; 95% CI, 1.14-2.07). The estimated direct annual health care costs associated with these disorders for women with PCOS were $3.075 billion for depression, $2.28 billion for anxiety and $714 million for eating disorders — equating to $6.069 billion in 2021 U.S. dollars.
“Clinicians and patients have to recognize that mental health disorders affect many women with polycystic ovary syndrome, and we [as clinicians] need to be prepared to address them and to treat them in these patients,” Azziz said.
Moving forward, Azziz suggested that more research — and more funding to do the research — is necessary to understand the impact of PCOS on day-to-day life.
“Polycystic ovary syndrome is a major disorder that still goes unrecognized; it's almost a silent epidemic,” Azziz said “... Funding for research in this area tends to continue to be relatively modest compared to the number of women who are affected. Part of that is that disorders in women tend to go unrecognized in general, and part of that is simply that the NIH and other officials have not really recognized polycystic ovary syndrome as the broad disorder that it is.”