Patients with multiple sclerosis (MS) have a moderate decrease in life expectancy with disease duration and disability strongly correlated to risk of dying, according to a multicenter observational study of 27,603 MS patients who were followed for an average of 15 years.
Researchers reviewed clinical longitudinal data from patients linked to the national deaths register and determined the death rates were significantly higher in men, patients with later clinical onset, and in progressive MS.
Overall excess mortality compared with the general population was moderate, with a standardized mortality ratio of 1.48, but increased considerably after 20 years of disease (2.20).
Citation: Leray E, Vukusic S, Debouverie M, et al. Excess mortality in patients with multiple sclerosis starts at 20 years from clinical onset: data from a large-scale French observational study. PLoS One. 2015;10(7):e0132033. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0132033.