The Impact of Avoidable Mortality on the Life Expectancy in Bulgarian Population

Abstract

Mortality due to avoidable causes of death is one of the most often used quality and efficiency indicators for the health care system and the policies of prevention of morbidity and mortality by causes of death due to behavioural or environmental factors. The objective of the article is to study the impact of avoidable mortality including amenable and preventable mortality on the life expectancy in Bulgaria during the period 2005-2012. The classification of avoidable mortality, proposed by the Office for National Statistics of the United Kingdom in 2011, is used. The methods of decomposing the change in two life expectancies by age and the change in two life expectancies by age according to the causes of death by E. Andreev and E. Arriaga are applied to measure the impact on the change in life expectancy. The main results of the study show that during the period 2005-2012 along with the decrease in the total mortality, also the avoidable mortality has dropped – from 34. 72 percent to 29. 12 percent of the mortality due to all causes of death. The avoidable causes’ of death contribution to life expectancy increase is by 1. 20 years and it is considerably greater than those of the other causes. Mortality due to amenable and preventable causes of death is also decreasing. Greater is the effect of the amenable causes of death on the life expectancy increase.