[Assessment of health related quality of life--part 3--preference based measures]

Preference Based questionnaires are instrumental in the use of Health Related Quality of Life in economic analyses in medicine. These questionnaires combine the features of Health State Measures with those of direct methods of valuations, and therefore link between a profile, which describes a certain health state, to the utility of living in that state. Using statistical models, which are based on values to a sample of profiles, a complete table of utilities for all profiles may be constructed. These utilities serve to evaluate the effectiveness, and cost-effectiveness, of medical interventions. This article describes the method of creating and valuing preference based questionnaires and discusses the problems inherent in using the utilities they produce. The article also covers four of the most common questionnaires- Health Utility Index (HUI), Quality of Well Being (QWB), EuroQoL 5 Dimensions (EQ-5D) and Short Form 6 Dimensions (SF-6D). Finally, it briefly mentions the subject of specific preference based questionnaires.