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Collaboration Between Tromsø Study and Global Burden of Disease Project


Image caption Picture: Yuri Arcurs/mostphotos.com

The Global Burden of Disease Study, led by the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation (IHME) at the University of Washington, Seattle, is a detailed project. It measures health losses from various diseases and injuries worldwide. The study covers different ages, genders, and locations, updating its data regularly. It provides estimates on mortality, causes of death, disability, and life expectancy. This information is used to understand health trends globally. GBD delivers regularly estimates for all-cause mortality, cause-specific deaths, years lost due to premature mortality (YLLs), years lived with disability (YLDs), disability-adjusted life years (DALYs), life expectancy, and health-adjusted life expectancy (HALE). More information can be found at IHME's GBD page.

Project period: 2015 - present

The Tromsø Study’s contribution

Since 2017, the Tromsø Study, via the Norwegian Institute of Public Health, has been sharing data with the GBD. The anonymized data from the Tromsø Study (Tromsø4-7) include questionnaire responses, biological samples, measurements, and clinical examinations. All analyses are conducted by GBD, and this collaboration helps the GBD publish annual disease burden reports in The Lancet. Results are shared with researchers for further study and publications. Researchers from UiT The Arctic University of Norway, involved with GBD (GBD Collaborators), contribute to and co-author various research papers.

Publications involving the Tromsø Study

In 2018, four articles based on the GBD 2017 cycle were released involving researcher from the Tromsø Study (1-4), followed by a 2019 Nordic study comparing disease burdens in Nordic countries (5). Recent endeavors focus on deeper collaboration among Nordic researchers, such as examining COVID-19 impacts in the region and use of the forecast data. The 2022 publications included disease burden data for Norwegian counties, with future projects aiming to forecast county-specific disease burdens and analyze the impact of avoidable risk factors on Norway's disease burden (6). Since 2020 papers with forecast of diseases analyses based on the GBD data are published (7).

GBD’s Evolution

The GBD project started in 1993 and has continually updated its approach and scope. The first report covered 107 diseases in eight regions, while the latest, GBD 2019, includes 286 causes of death across 204 countries, and detailed subnational locations in 21 countries for each year from 1990 to 2019. This helps in understanding global health trends and needs.

IHME Collaborator network

IHME's collaborative network includes experts in various health-related fields who contribute to the GBD and its related research projects. Network members include specialists in demography, specific diseases, injuries, impairments, risk factors, and country or region-specific epidemiology.

Importance for Health Policy

Accurate and current disease burden estimates are crucial for health policy planning. However, the quality of these results is directly linked to the quality of the underlying data. Enhancing the GBD's outcomes for Norway necessitates expanded national collaboration in data production and utilization. Integrating more high-quality Norwegian health data into the analyses would improve the validity of national and county-level disease burden assessments.

Members 

Anne Elise Eggen (Internal Project Manager)
Ola Løvsletten
Rebecca Hetland
Ann Kristin Skrindo Knudsen
Liane Ong
Johan Månsson

Publications
  1. GBD 2017 Risk Factor Collaborators. Global, regional, and national comparative risk assessment of 84 behavioural, environmental and occupational, and metabolic risks or clusters of risks for 195 countries and territories, 1990-2017: a systematic analysis for the Global Burden of Disease Study 2017. Lancet. 2018;392:1923-1994.
  1. GBD 2017 Causes of Death Collaborators. Global, regional, and national age-sex-specific mortality for 282 causes of death in 195 countries and territories, 1980-2017: a systematic analysis for the Global Burden of Disease Study 2017. Lancet. 2018;392:1736-1788. 
  1. GBD 2017 Mortality Collaborators. Global, regional, and national age-sex-specific mortality and life expectancy, 1950-2017: a systematic analysis for the Global Burden of Disease Study 2017. Lancet. 2018;392:1684-1735.
  1. GBD 2017 DALYs and HALE Collaborators. Global, regional, and national disability-adjusted life-years (DALYs) for 359 diseases and injuries and healthy life expectancy (HALE) for 195 countries and territories, 1990-2017: a systematic analysis for the Global Burden of Disease Study 2017. Lancet. 2018;392:1859-1922.
  1. Nordic Burden of Disease Collaborators. Life expectancy and disease burden in the Nordic countries: results from the Global Burden of Diseases, Injuries, and Risk Factors Study 2017. Lancet Public Health. 2019;4:e658-e669. 
  1. GBD 2019 Norway Subnational Collaborators. Changes in life expectancy and disease burden in the 11 Norwegian counties 1990-2019: a systematic analysis for the Global Burden of Disease Study 2019. The Lancet Public Health 2022;7:e593-e605.

  2. Vollset SE et al. Fertility, mortality, migration, and population scenarios for 195 countries and territories from 2017 to 2100: a forecasting analysis for the Global Burden of Disease Study. Lancet 2020;396:1285-306.