Quality of life measures are becoming key components for clinical decisions. Physicians no longer can make treatment decisions without engaging the patient in the process. Since patients often value quality of life over quantity of life, health care providers need to be able to assist the patient in evaluating quality of life when making treatment decisions. Quality of life instruments can help clinicians screen for psychosocial problems that can be the focus of treatment.
Measuring quality of life at the population level enables researchers and policy makers to see trends in the well-being of populations beyond the disease level, to evaluate the far ranging effects of health and social policies, and to determine how to allocate resources
Medical and nursing outcomes typically include biological and physiological measurements, signs and symptoms of disease and functional status. Quality of life outcomes, in contrast, focus on how much benefit and satisfaction patients derive from a given treatment. Evaluation of treatment strategies includes monitoring changes over time and assessing the relative impact of alternative treatments. Quality of life can be used as a predictor of outcomes in general and treatment outcomes in particular. See Staquet, Hayes and Fayers (1998) book for detailed information on the development of clinical trials.
When policy makers implement new policies, it is important that the effects of policy changes be evaluated. For, example, quality of life changes are important to measure in the populations that are affected by changes in health care services.
Industries can use quality of life information to decide which drugs or devices to develop and market, see adverse reactions that would be missed if taking only a biophysiological approach, and to measure palliation of disease if cure or prevention is not possible. See Cramer and Spilker (1998) book for detailed information on quality of life outcomes in drug trials.
Last updated 5 September 2000