The impact of symptoms and impairments on overall health in US national health data
UMass Chan Affiliations
Department of Quantitative Health SciencesDocument Type
Journal ArticlePublication Date
2008-08-30Keywords
AdultAged
Anxiety Disorders
*Attitude to Health
Depressive Disorder
*Disability Evaluation
Fatigue
Female
Health Expenditures
*Health Status Indicators
Health Surveys
Humans
Male
Middle Aged
Pain
Quality of Life
Questionnaires
Regression Analysis
Reproducibility of Results
Self Care
United States
Biostatistics
Epidemiology
Health Services Research
Metadata
Show full item recordAbstract
OBJECTIVE: To assess the effects on overall self-rated health of the broad range of symptoms and impairments that are routinely asked about in national surveys. DATA: We use data from adults in the nationally representative Medical Expenditure Panel Survey (MEPS) 2002 with validation in an independent sample from MEPS 2000. METHODS: Regression analysis is used to relate impairments and symptoms to a 100-point self-rating of general health status. The effect of each impairment and symptom on health-related quality of life (HRQOL) is estimated from regression coefficients, accounting for interactions between them. RESULTS: Impairments and symptoms most strongly associated with overall health include pain, self-care limitations, and having little or no energy. The most prevalent are moderate pain, severe anxiety, moderate depressive symptoms, and low energy. Effects are stable across different waves of MEPS, and questions cover a broader range of impairments and symptoms than existing health measurement instruments. CONCLUSIONS: This method makes use of the rich detail on impairments and symptoms in existing national data, quantifying their independent effects on overall health. Given the ongoing availability of these data and the shortcomings of traditional utility methods, it would be valuable to compare existing HRQOL measures to other methods, such as the one presented herein, for use in tracking population health over time.Source
Med Care. 2008 Sep;46(9):954-62. Link to article on publisher's siteDOI
10.1097/MLR.0b013e318179199fPermanent Link to this Item
http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.14038/47796PubMed ID
18725850Related Resources
Link to Article in PubMedae974a485f413a2113503eed53cd6c53
10.1097/MLR.0b013e318179199f
Scopus Count
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