Quality of life in functional dyspepsia

Quality of Life (QOL) in medicine has many meanings but is a subjective entity that broadly refers to those factors that make life worth living for the individual patient with a disease. Measures of health-related QOL assess health perception as well as physical, emotional and social function, and this is referred to as functional status. Such measurement is now considered to be a key factor in the assessment of patients with conditions such as functional dyspepsia, where there is chronic or recurrent unexplained pain or discomfort centred in the upper abdomen. QOL measures may be used to try and discriminate among a number of disease groups or to assess change in disease status over time; different approaches are usually necessary to meet these goals.