title: Quality of life: questionnaires and questions.
abstract: Quality of life (QoL) is a phrase often used in health care settings at policy and administration levels, in clinical assessments of therapies, and in clinical management of individual cases. While QoL is a broad concept that covers such areas as social, environmental, economic, and health satisfaction, health-related quality of life (HRQL) is less wide ranging, including mental and physical health and their consequences. First, I question the singularity of HRQL, suggesting there are at least two distinct meanings of HRQL. Second, questionnaires designed to assess individual patients' HRQL allow a limited range of ways for patients to express their state of being. The Medical Outcomes Study Short Form (SF-36), which operationalises HRQL for a traditional clinical setting, is used to show in detail the restricted options that are available for patient respondents. The communications limitations of utility-based measures, designed as cost-effectiveness measures but often used as though they were HRQL instruments, are also discussed. For assessing the HRQL of individuals in a health setting, such questionnaires can provide only a starting point, which should be supplemented with good interaction and communication.
authors.affiliation: English Language and Linguistics, Roehampton University, London, UK. A.mooney@roehampton.ac.uk
authors.forename: Annabelle
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Mooney
mesh_terms: D001294:Attitude to Health; D003362:Cost-Benefit Analysis; D006801:Humans; D017063:Outcome Assessment, Health Care / Q000379:methods*; D011594:Psychometrics / Q000295:instrumentation*; D011788:Quality of Life; D019057:Quality-Adjusted Life Years; D040841:Resource Allocation; D018434:Sickness Impact Profile; D011795:Surveys and Questionnaires