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Fatigue in patients with chronic disease: results from the population-based Lifelines Cohort Study

  • Dept of Research and Education, Horn, Netherlands
  • Institute for Public Health Genomics (IPHG), Department of Genetics and Cell Biology, Research Institute GROW, University of Maastricht, Maastricht, The Netherlands;
  • Maastricht University
  • Amsterdam Public Health
  • Radboud University Medical Center
  • Hasselt University
  • University of Groningen, University Medical Center Groningen
  • CIRO
  • Maastricht UMC
  • Amsterdam UMC - University of Amsterdam
  • Radboud University Nijmegen
  • School of Life Sciences
  • University of Groningen

Research output: Contribution to journalArticleAcademicpeer-review

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Abstract

(1) To evaluate the prevalence of severe and chronic fatigue in subjects with and without chronic disease; (2) to assess to which extent multi-morbidity contributes to severe and chronic fatigue; and (3) to identify predisposing and associated factors for severe and chronic fatigue and whether these are disease-specific, trans-diagnostic, or generic. The Dutch Lifelines cohort was used, including 78,363 subjects with (n = 31,039, 53 ± 12 years, 33% male) and without (n = 47,324, 48 ± 12 years, 46% male) ≥ 1 of 23 chronic diseases. Fatigue was assessed with the Checklist Individual Strength-Fatigue. Compared to participants without a chronic disease, a higher proportion of participants with ≥ 1 chronic disease were severely (23% versus 15%, p < 0.001) and chronically (17% versus 10%, p < 0.001) fatigued. The odds of having severe fatigue (OR [95% CI]) increased from 1.6 [1.5–1.7] with one chronic disease to 5.5 [4.5–6.7] with four chronic diseases; for chronic fatigue from 1.5 [1.5–1.6] to 4.9 [3.9–6.1]. Multiple trans-diagnostic predisposing and associated factors of fatigue were found, explaining 26% of variance in fatigue in chronic disease. Severe and chronic fatigue are highly prevalent in chronic diseases. Multi-morbidity increases the odds of having severe and chronic fatigue. Several trans-diagnostic factors were associated with fatigue, providing a rationale for a trans-diagnostic approach.

Original languageEnglish
Article number20977
JournalScientific reports
Volume11
Issue number1
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 1 Dec 2021

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