The out-of-pocket expenses of people with tinnitus in Europe.

BACKGROUND: Despite the high frequency of tinnitus and its impact on wellbeing, little is known about its economic burden and no data to our knowledge are available on out-of-pocket (OOP) expenses. METHODS: In 2022 a survey was conducted on OOP costs of tinnitus. We enrolled 679 participants with slight, moderate and severe tinnitus in Italy, United Kingdom, Netherlands, Germany and Spain. We estimated annual OOP expenses for tinnitus-related healthcare visits, treatments, medications and alternative medicine practices. Prevalence of tinnitus in the general population, obtained from a representative survey we conducted in Europe in 2017-2018, was used to generalise costs for people with any tinnitus at the national level. RESULTS: OOP expenses were 368€ (95% confidence intervals (CI), 78€-690€), 728€ (95% CI, 316€-1,288€), and 1,492€ (95% CI, 760€-2,688€) for slight, moderate, and severe tinnitus, respectively, with annual expenditure of 565€ for people with any tinnitus: 209€ for healthcare visits, 93€ for treatments, 16€ for drugs, 64€ for hearing supporting systems and 183€ for acupuncture, homeopathy and osteopathy. Individuals with slight, moderate, and severe tinnitus expressed a willingness to invest 1.6, 4.3, and 7.0 times their monthly income, respectively, to achieve complete relief from tinnitus. CONCLUSIONS: This study offers for the first time insights into the OOP expenses incurred by individuals with tinnitus. OOP expenses exhibited substantial variations based on severity status, accounting for more than 17 thousand million€ in the countries considered. In terms of financial burden, these findings align tinnitus to the recognised leading disabilities, including back pain and migraine.

Should I give kids money? The role of pocket money on at-risk behaviors in Italian adolescents.

BACKGROUND: Discussion on the impact of pocket money on positive behaviors is still debated. OBJECTIVE: To investigate the effect of diverse money allowance schemes on risky behaviors (smoking, alcohol, binge drinking, drug use, gambling) during adolescence. METHOD: 989 students aged 15 from Lombardy (Italy) reported information on money availability in the 2018 wave of the Health Behaviour in School-aged Children study. To analyze the relationship between money availability and risky behaviors we computed odds ratios and 95% confidence intervals through unconditional multiple logistic regression models. RESULTS: Spending more than 10€ weekly was associated with higher likelihood to smoke, binge drink or gamble. Receiving pocket money (rather than receiving money upon request) was related to higher likelihood to engage in risky behaviors. CONCLUSIONS: Pocket money may have a negative impact on adolescents, particularly with a substantial amount of money. More research is needed to understand why providing money only if needed may serve as a protective factor against risky behaviors.

Recommendations for the Design and Delivery of Transitions-Focused Digital Health Interventions: Rapid Review.

BACKGROUND: Older adults experience a high risk of adverse events during hospital-to-home transitions. Implementation barriers have prevented widespread clinical uptake of the various digital health technologies that aim to support hospital-to-home transitions. OBJECTIVE: To guide the development of a digital health intervention to support transitions from hospital to home (the Digital Bridge intervention), the specific objectives of this review were to describe the various roles and functions of health care providers supporting hospital-to-home transitions for older adults, allowing future technologies to be more targeted to support their work; describe the types of digital health interventions used to facilitate the transition from hospital to home for older adults and elucidate how these interventions support the roles and functions of providers; describe the lessons learned from the design and implementation of these interventions; and identify opportunities to improve the fit between technology and provider functions within the Digital Bridge intervention and other transition-focused digital health interventions. METHODS: This 2-phase rapid review involved a selective review of providers' roles and their functions during hospital-to-home transitions (phase 1) and a structured literature review on digital health interventions used to support older adults' hospital-to-home transitions (phase 2). During the analysis, the technology functions identified in phase 2 were linked to the provider roles and functions identified in phase 1. RESULTS: In phase 1, various provider roles were identified that facilitated hospital-to-home transitions, including navigation-specific roles and the roles of nurses and physicians. The key transition functions performed by providers were related to the 3 categories of continuity of care (ie, informational, management, and relational continuity). Phase 2, included articles (n=142) that reported digital health interventions targeting various medical conditions or groups. Most digital health interventions supported management continuity (eg, follow-up, assessment, and monitoring of patients' status after hospital discharge), whereas informational and relational continuity were the least supported. The lessons learned from the interventions were categorized into technology- and research-related challenges and opportunities and informed several recommendations to guide the design of transition-focused digital health interventions. CONCLUSIONS: This review highlights the need for Digital Bridge and other digital health interventions to align the design and delivery of digital health interventions with provider functions, design and test interventions with older adults, and examine multilevel outcomes. INTERNATIONAL REGISTERED REPORT IDENTIFIER (IRRID): RR2-10.1136/bmjopen-2020-045596.

Global Prevalence and Incidence of Tinnitus: A Systematic Review and Meta-analysis.

Importance: To date, no systematic review has taken a meta-analytic approach to estimating the prevalence and incidence of tinnitus in the general population. Objective: To provide frequency estimates of tinnitus worldwide. Data Sources: An umbrella review followed by a traditional systematic review was performed by searching PubMed-MEDLINE and Embase from inception through November 19, 2021. Study Selection: Research data from the general population were selected, and studies based on patients or on subgroups of the population with selected lifestyle habits were excluded. No restrictions were applied according to date, age, sex, and country. Data Extraction and Synthesis: Relevant extracted information included type of study, time and location, end point, population characteristics, and tinnitus definition. The study followed the Meta-analysis of Observational Studies in Epidemiology (MOOSE) reporting guideline. Main Outcomes and Measures: Pooled prevalence estimates of any tinnitus, severe tinnitus, chronic tinnitus, and diagnosed tinnitus as well as incidence of tinnitus were obtained using random-effects meta-analytic models; heterogeneity between studies was controlled using the χ2 test, and inconsistency was measured using the I2 statistic. Results: Among 767 publications, 113 eligible articles published between 1972 and 2021 were identified, and prevalence estimates from 83 articles and incidence estimates from 12 articles were extracted. The pooled prevalence of any tinnitus among adults was 14.4% (95% CI, 12.6%-16.5%) and ranged from 4.1% (95% CI, 3.7%-4.4%) to 37.2% (95% CI, 34.6%-39.9%). Prevalence estimates did not significantly differ by sex (14.1% [95% CI, 11.6%-17.0%] among male individuals; 13.1% [95% CI, 10.5%-16.2%] among female individuals), but increased prevalence was associated with age (9.7% [95% CI, 7.4%-12.5%] among adults aged 18-44 years; 13.7% [95% CI, 11.0%-17.0%] among those aged 45-64 years; and 23.6% [95% CI, 19.4%-28.5%] among those aged ≥65 years; P < .001 among age groups). The pooled prevalence of severe tinnitus was 2.3% (95% CI, 1.7%-3.1%), ranging from 0.5% (95% CI, 0.3%-0.7%) to 12.6% (95% CI, 11.1%-14.1%). The pooled prevalence of chronic tinnitus was 9.8% (95% CI, 4.7%-19.3%) and the pooled prevalence of diagnosed tinnitus was 3.4% (95% CI, 2.1%-5.5%). The pooled incidence rate of any tinnitus was 1164 per 100 000 person-years (95% CI, 479-2828 per 100 000 person-years). Conclusions and Relevance: Despite the substantial heterogeneity among studies, this comprehensive systematic review on the prevalence and incidence of tinnitus suggests that tinnitus affects more than 740 million adults globally and is perceived as a major problem by more than 120 million people, mostly aged 65 years or older. Health policy makers should consider the global burden of tinnitus, and greater effort should be devoted to boost research on tinnitus.

Frailty beyond the clinical dimension: discussion about the underlying aspect of the social capital.

It is repeatedly advocated in the medical literature the need of reshaping the care process in order to better address the unmet clinical needs of the highly vulnerable and complex ageing population. In the past twenty years, frailty has assumed the role of an arising and independent geriatric condition, different from disability and multimorbidity. Frailty is highly prevalent in older persons. The proper management of frailty relies on the accurate collection and interpretation of a wide spectrum of information about the health status of the individual. However, the optimal intervention plan cannot be correctly designed and implemented without the evaluation of the social characteristics of the frail older person. Unfortunately, this aspect has frequently been overlooked and research is still lagging on the topic. The main scope of this review is to present current evidence and propose possible axes of investigation in this field.