The pattern and gender disparity in global burden of age-related macular degeneration

To explore the trend patterns and gender disparity in global burden of age-related macular degeneration (AMD) by year, age, and socioeconomic status using disability-adjusted life-years (DALYs) from Global Burden of Disease (GBD) study 2017.

DALYs and impairment data caused by AMD were extracted from GBD Study 2017. World Bank income level (WBIL) and human development index (HDI) in 2017 were cited as indicators of socioeconomic status. The Gini coefficients and the concentration indexes were calculated to unveil trends in between-country inequality. The association between gender inequality and socioeconomic levels was analyzed by Pearson correlation.

Total age-standardized DALYs of AMD showed a slightly descending pattern in recent years. However, gender disparity has existed since 1990 for almost three decades, with female being more heavily impacted. This pattern became more obvious with aging and varied among different WHO and WBIL regions. Meanwhile, female subjects tended to have higher vision impairments. Gini coefficients of AMD burden increased from 0.423 to 0.448, while the ones of female-to-male ratio fluctuated around 0.11 between 1990 and 2017, with concentration indexes changing from 0.024 to −0.057 and 0.046 to 0.029 respectively. Female-minus-male difference (r = 0.1721, p = 0.0195) and female-to-male ratio (r = 0.2072, p = 0.0048) of age-standardized DALYs rates were positively related to HDI.

Though global AMD health care is progressing, gender imbalance in disease burden of AMD distribution barely improved. Gender sensitive health policy should be emphasized for the increasing elder population and relieving the higher AMD burden of females.