Quality of Life as the Basis of Health Care Resource Allocation : A Philosopher ' s Perspective on QALYs by Richard
نویسنده
چکیده
The concept of the quality-adjusted life year (QALY) provides a simple technical tool for summarising the impact a medical condition has on someone's life and the impact a health care intervention can have on that medical condition. In the former case, QALYs (and related concepts, such as disability-adjusted life years, DALYs) have been useful in producing summary statistics on the burden of disease, while, in the latter case, QALYs are commonly used in evaluating the effectiveness of health technologies [1-4]. In particular, the QALY is at the heart of initiatives such as the UK 's National Institute for Clinical Excellence (NICE), which provides detailed cost-effectiveness evaluations of medical interventions and technologies [5].
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