Summary
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About 2.2 million Australians were living with long-term neurological conditions in 2022, and over three-quarters (1.7 million) of these were living with migraine.
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Females were almost twice as likely as males to be living with a long-term neurological condition (about 11% of females compared with about 6.1% of males) in 2022.
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Neurological conditions were the 5th leading cause of disease burden in 2024, accounting for 8.4% of the total disease burden in Australia.
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In 2021–22, 60% of Australians in permanent residential aged care had neurological conditions listed as a condition affecting care.
This report presents both crude and age-standardised rates, where available.
Crude rates are based on unadjusted data and indicate whether there is a difference between populations without accounting for differences in the age structures of the populations.
Age-standardised rates are based on data that are adjusted to account for differences in the age structures of the populations.
Therefore, a difference between 2 populations in crude rates indicates that the rate differs between them. The differences may be due to any number of factors, including different age structures of the populations. In contrast, a difference between 2 populations in age-standardised rates indicates that the rate differs between them but that this difference is not due to different age-structures.
For example, a difference in the prevalence rate between males and females indicates that prevalence differs between them, and this difference in prevalence could be due to any number of risk factors, including age. A difference in the age-standardised prevalence rate between males and females indicates that prevalence differs between them and, furthermore, that this difference in prevalence is not due to age.
For more information on rate calculations, see the Technical notes in this report.
How common are neurological conditions?
- About 8.7% of all Australians (2.2 million people) in 2022 and 9.3% of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander (First Nations) people in 2022–23 were living with at least one long-term neurological condition.
- A higher percentage of females than males were living with a long-term neurological condition – the sex difference has been present since at least 2001.
- The most common long-term neurological condition was migraine, accounting for more than three-quarters of Australians living with neurological conditions and affecting 6.6% of all Australians and 7.4% of First Nations people.
- Tasmania (12%) had the highest percentage of people living with a neurological condition in 2022, whereas the Northern Territory (6.1%) had the lowest percentage.
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About 8.7% of all Australians (2.2 million people) were living with long-term neurological conditions in 2022, with females almost twice as likely as males to be living with neurological conditions (11% compared with 6.1%, respectively).
What health services are used to treat and manage neurological conditions?
- There were almost 365,000 hospitalisations (1,350 per 100,000 population, or 1,250 per 100,000 population age-standardised) and over 132,000 emergency department (ED) presentations (about 490 per 100,000 population, or about 470 per 100,000 population age-standardised) with a neurological condition as the principal diagnosis, in 2023–24.
- Migraine accounted for almost 1 in 4 ED presentations for neurological conditions, and epilepsy accounted for more than 1 in 5.
- Females were hospitalised and presented at ED for neurological conditions at a higher rate than males (even after accounting for age differences).
- The lowest socioeconomic areas had the lowest age-standardised rate of hospitalisations due to neurological conditions but the highest rate of ED presentations; the highest socioeconomic areas had the highest age-standardised rate of hospitalisations but the lowest rate of ED presentations.
- Remote and very remote areas had the lowest age-standardised rate of hospitalisations due to neurological conditions but the highest age-standardised rate of ED presentations when compared with Outer regional areas, Inner regional areas and Major cities.
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The age-standardised rate of hospitalisations (per 100,000 population) was highest for the highest socioeconomic areas and lowest for the lowest socioeconomic areas.
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The age-standardised rate of ED presentations (per 100,000 population) was highest for the lowest socioeconomic areas and lowest for the highest socioeconomic areas.
The opposite patterns for hospitalisations as compared with ED presentations, between different socioeconomic and remoteness areas, may suggest that people in lower socioeconomic areas and in Remote and very remote areas may have poorer access to care systems, compared with people in higher socioeconomic areas and Major cities, respectively. Such care systems may include better navigation of health services including planned hospital visits, more availability of quality care at home and better social supports for informal at home care. This might increase planned hospital visits but reduce the need for going to emergency departments.
Further investigation is required to better understand the differences in patterns of hospitalisations and ED presentations.
Impact: health-system costs, burden of disease and mortality
- An estimated $6.6 billion of health-system costs were for neurological conditions, representing 3.6% of all health system costs.
- Neurological conditions were the 5th leading cause of disease burden in Australia, accounting for 8.4% of the total disease burden.
- Neurological conditions were the underlying cause of 6.5% of all deaths in Australia (44 deaths per 100,000 population, or 32 deaths per 100,000 population age-standardised).
Key data gaps and data improvement activities
Underestimating statistics for neurological conditions
For prevalence, hospitalisations, emergency department presentations and mortality statistics, this report uses the conditions listed under the category of “Diseases of the nervous system” in the International Statistical Classification of Diseases and Related Health Problems 10th revision (and its Australian modification), or ICD-10(-AM). This means that some neurological conditions are not included in the prevalence, hospitalisations, emergency department and mortality statistics reported here.
For example, only 3 types of dementia are classified under “Diseases of the nervous system” by the ICD-10(-AM), with other types of dementia classified under various other condition categories. Therefore, the numbers reported here do not account for all the different types of dementia. For prevalence, hospitalisations and mortality statistics that include all of the variants of dementia as a combined category, see AIHW’s Dementia in Australia report.
See the Data sources section of this report for more details on the condition codes used for reporting from the National Health Survey, National Hospital Morbidity Database, National Non-admitted Patient Emergency Department Care Database and the National Mortality Database.
Data development works in progress
- Epidemiology of Parkinson’s disease and motor neurone disease (including estimating prevalence) using linked data from the National Health Data Hub (NHDH), a collaboration between AIHW and researchers at the University of Tasmania.
- Epidemiology of Huntington’s disease (including estimating prevalence) using linked data from the NHDH, a project by researchers at Monash University with AIHW as discussants.
Data development work for future updates
- Ensuring that all the different types of dementia are included in the estimates for prevalence, hospitalisations, emergency department presentations and mortality.
- Establishing a consistent standard for classifying neurological conditions across the different data sources (such as aligning to the Australian Burden of Disease Study). This will make the estimates for prevalence, hospitalisations, emergency department presentations and mortality more consistent with the estimates for burden of disease and health-system expenditure.