The global epidemic of multi-morbidity among the aging population is of great concern. The present study tries to assess the independent effect of multi-morbidity on psychological distress among the indigenous population in India using the Longitudinal Ageing Study in India Wave 1, 2017-18 data. The final analytical sample for the present study is 12,690 aged 45 and above. Psychological distress was assessed in LASI using the tested and widely-utilized Composite International Diagnostic Interview short-form (CIDI-SF) scale that assesses psychiatric depression. Among various diseases (multi-morbidity) considered in the study, the most prevalent chronic disease was hypertension followed by diabetes and then cancer. Propensity score matching analysis has been performed to reduce the confounding biases and generate optimum results. The results obtained from the binary logistic regression showed that those having one or more chronic diseases have a 1.69 times higher chance of being psychologically distressed. The widowed indigenous population has a 1.89 times higher chance of having psychological distress than the non-widowed.
Further, the results from propensity score matching show that those having one or more morbidity have a 2.1% higher chance of having psychological distress. Average Treatment Effect on Treated (ATT) that if those having one or more morbidity poses psychological distress of (0.043) but without morbidity conditions their prevalence of psychological distress reduces to (0.039). At the same time, those without multi-morbidity have psychological distress of (0.022) unit but if they have the morbidity condition their prevalence of psychological distress increases and becomes (0.040) unit. Similarly, the Average Treatment Effect on Untreated (ATU) from propensity score matching shows that if the indigenous populations with one or more morbidity conditions were without it the psychological distress reduces to (0.022) unit and those without one or more morbidity conditions had the treatment/morbidity condition the psychological distress increases to (0.040) unit.
