EAN 2026 | The SocialMS study: the impact of MS on social determinants of health

So the SocialMS study is a cross-sectional study which is based in Italy and it is based on questionnaires so the data are self-reported by patients and specifically the aim of our study was to evaluate the impact of MS on several social determinants of health. In fact it is known that social determinants of health can affect several aspects of life of the patients beyond the physical aspects, so disability. And that’s why we decided to conduct this study. And specifically, we evaluated four different social determinants of health, including education, employment, social life, economic resources. And we wanted to evaluate the impact of the disease on these specific aspects, evaluate interrelationships as well as risk factors for identifying individuals who present a higher burden of the disease as well as the role of social support in this context. And specifically our main endpoint was the number of social determinants of health which were affected by the disease. And we were able to collect more than 1,000 individuals from Italy, from the north to the south. And individuals’ disability was evaluated using the PDDS because, in fact, this was a self-reported disability, and the median was around one. Individuals were mainly females, and the most common phenotype was the relapsing-remitting one. We found, actually, that many patients reported these domains to be impacted, especially 50%, around 50% for social life, as well as for the employment, followed by the economic aspects reported by around 30% and education reported by 19% of the individuals. And we also observed that there were very high interrelationships between all these domains that were impacted. And the main risk factors for a greater MS burden, including both social economic factors, socioeconomic factors, but also comorbidities as well as disability. So this means that those that are more vulnerable from several points of view are actually more at risk of a greater burden of the disease. And regarding social support, actually, we found that around 90% reported some forms of social support, especially the intangible ones. And as the number of domains increased, the domains affected by the disease increased, actually the support was reported more frequently. So this was a good result. So in conclusion, the main finding is that actually MS has an impact on many aspects of this patient. So we need to be careful in evaluating, recognizing social problems as well as in addressing problems related to social determinants of health.

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