Objectives

Major depression in South Korea, which remains under-diagnosed and under-treated, increases the risk of premature death, and reduces quality of life and work productivity. The aim of this study was to quantify the depression-related health and productivity loss in South Korea in terms of life-years lost and productivity-adjusted life-years (PALYs) lost.

Method

Age and sex-specific life table models simulated follow-up of South Koreans with depression aged 15 to 54 years, until 55 years. Depression was defined as major depression. Inputs were drawn from national datasets and published sources. Models were constructed for the cohort with depression and repeated assuming they had no depression. Differences in total deaths, years of life, and PALYs represented the impact of depression. PALYs were ascribed a financial value equivalent to total gross domestic product (GDP) divided by the number of equivalent full-time workers (KRW81,507,146 or USD74,748). All outcomes were discounted by 3% per annum.

Results

In 2019, there were more than 500,000 people aged 15–54 years with major depression in South Korea. We predicted that until this cohort reached age 55 years, and assuming 22.2% of people with depression are treated, depression led to 12,000 excess deaths, more than 55,000 discounted years of life lost and 1.6 million discounted PALYs lost, equating to KRW133 trillion (USD122 billion) in lost GDP. Applying treatment-related response and remission rates of 11.8% and 42.1%, respectively, and a non-response/non-remission rate of 46.1%, increased the total number of PALYs lost by almost 6.0%.

Conclusions

Our study highlights the considerable productivity loss attributable to depression among South Koreans over their working lifetime. Better prevention and treatment of depression is needed for long-term economic gains.

中文翻译：

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韩国抑郁症对健康和生产力的负担

目标

韩国的重度抑郁症仍未得到充分诊断和治疗，这增加了过早死亡的风险，并降低了生活质量和工作效率。本研究的目的是通过生命年损失和生产力调整生命年 (PALY) 损失来量化韩国与抑郁症相关的健康和生产力损失。

方法

年龄和性别特定的生命表模型模拟了韩国 15 至 54 岁抑郁症患者的随访，直至 55 岁。抑郁症被定义为重度抑郁症。输入来自国家数据集和已发布的来源。为患有抑郁症的队列构建模型并重复假设他们没有抑郁症。总死亡人数、寿命年数和 PALY 的差异代表了抑郁症的影响。PALY 的财务价值相当于国内生产总值 (GDP) 除以同等的全职员工人数（81,507,146 韩元或 74,748 美元）。所有结果每年都打折 3%。

结果

2019年，韩国15-54岁的重度抑郁症患者超过50万人。我们预测，在该队列达到 55 岁之前，假设 22.2% 的抑郁症患者得到治疗，抑郁症导致 12,000 人超额死亡、超过 55,000 年折算寿命损失和 160 万折算 PALY 损失，相当于 133 万亿韩元（122 美元）亿）损失的 GDP。分别应用 11.8% 和 42.1% 的治疗相关反应和缓解率以及 46.1% 的无反应/无缓解率，使 PALY 丢失的总数增加了近 6.0%。

结论

我们的研究强调了韩国人在其职业生涯中因抑郁而导致的生产力大幅下降。要想获得长期的经济收益，就需要更好地预防和治疗抑郁症。