Importance of differentiating health status from quality of life

Abstract

Of nine exhibits in the Quality of Life with Diabetes poster event at the recent European Association for the Study of Diabetes meeting in Jerusalem,1 five used measures of health status (EQ5D and SF-36) and two others used measures of well-being (W-BQ22). All nine referred to the measures used as quality-of-life measures. The EQ5D2 and SF-363 measure how people feel about their health (physical and mental) and the W-BQ224 measures feelings of depression, anxiety, energy, and positive well-being. If people feel that their health or well-being is poor, they may feel that their quality of life is also impaired, though this is not necessarily the case. The opposite – that just because they feel that their health is excellent and they are not depressed or anxious, their quality of life is excellent – may not be true either.