Keio University

Elucidation of Comorbidity Patterns of Chronic Diseases Based on Nationwide Data of 1.69 Million High-Cost Patients—A Report on the Results of the "Commissioned Research Project Utilizing External Experts (Phase 1)" by Kyokai Kenpo (National Health Insurance Association)—

Publish: October 19, 2023
Public Relations Office

2023/10/19

Keio University

Tokyo Medical and Dental University

Kawasaki Medical School

Japan Health Insurance Association

In fiscal year 2020, the Japan Health Insurance Association (Kyokai Kenpo) launched a commissioned research project to provide external experts with an environment for analyzing anonymized health checkup and claims data for its approximately 40 million members. Through this research project, a research group including Professor Fuminori Katsukawa of the Sports Medicine Research Center at Keio University, Professor Keita Yamauchi of the Graduate School of Health Management at the same university, Professor Kunihiko Takahashi of the M&D Data Science Center at Tokyo Medical and Dental University, and Professor Eiichiro Kanda of the School of Medicine at Kawasaki Medical School has clarified the patterns of multimorbidity based on data from 1.69 million high-cost patients. Previous studies using data from Kyokai Kenpo (National Health Insurance Association) have mostly been reported at the branch level, and this research group is the first to publish a paper on a research project using a nationwide database.

The findings of this study will help to understand multimorbidity, a complex pathological condition, and are expected to be useful in considering which conditions should be prioritized in future health policies.

The results of this research were published online in the international scientific journal PLoS One on September 28, 2023.

For the full press release, please see below.

Press Release (PDF)