Adverse childhood experiences increase the long-term accumulation of morbidity in women

The impact of early-life traumatic experiences on late-life morbidity, or chronic conditions, remains unclear. We tested the hypothesis that traumatic adverse childhood experiences, such as physical, verbal, emotional, or sexual abuse, experienced during childhood or early adulthood are associated with a higher rate of morbidity later in life in women.

We studied 1026 women aged 21-45 years randomly selected from the general population in Olmsted County, Minnesota and used the Rochester Epidemiology Project medical records-linkage system to measure the rate of development of 18 chronic conditions. The women had a median age of 41.0 years at inclusion in the study and were followed historically for a median of 21.0 years.

Here we show that women who experienced 2 or more adverse childhood experiences have higher incidence of 10 of the 18 chronic conditions considered separately and an accelerated accumulation of chronic conditions measured as a morbidity score compared to women who did not experience any. In addition, women exposed to abuse in childhood or early adulthood have accelerated accumulation of morbidity. We exclude the possible confounding effect of socioeconomic status and explore a series of possible mediation events or characteristics. We also discuss several possible biological and social or behavioral mechanisms underlying these associations.

We are reporting new evidence that adverse childhood experiences and abuse in childhood or early adulthood have multiple deleterious effects on late-life morbidity. Our findings indicate the importance of protecting children and young adults from abuse and other adverse events.