How prevalent are complex illnesses?

Complex illnesses affect at least 130 million Americans (after deduplication). 130 million out of 340 million Americans is roughly 38% of the population — just under 4 in 10 Americans. However, 130 million Americans is the conservative, deduplicated number. The raw sum across all categories below approaches 400+ million — more than the entire U.S. population — which indicates how much overlap and co-morbidity exists in this space.

Why is it so hard to cure complex illnesses?

The average complex patient isn’t dealing with just one category; they’re dealing with two, three, or four simultaneously.

That’s exactly why care coordination is so broken in the U.S. Our care ecosystem–the healthcare, wellness, and human services sectors–were built for single-condition episodes.

What are complex illnesses?

Complex illnesses include rare, genetic, congenital, developmental, chronic & event-triggered illnesses.

• Rare illnesses (any disease affecting fewer than 200,000 Americans; more than 7,000 rare diseases collectively affects 30 million Americans)
• Genetic illnessess (any disease caused by a mutation in a person’s DNA; overlaps with rare; affects 50 million Americans)
• Congenital illnessess (any disease that a person is born with; overlaps with genetic; affects 18 million American survivors)
• Developmental illnesses (affects 17 million Americans)
  • Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD)
  • Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD)
  • and more…
• Chronic illnesses (affects 194 million American adults & 22 million children)
• Event-triggered illnesses (affects 100 million Americans)

Check out our list of complex illnesses by name and the associations that can provide you more details.