CDC: Health-related Quality of Life    In public health and medicine, the concept of health-related quality of life refers to a person or group’s perceived physical and mental health over time. Physicians have often used health-related quality of life (HRQOL) to measure the effects of chronic illness in their patients to better understand how an illness interferes with a person’s day-to-day life. Similarly, public health professionals use health-related quality of life to measure the effects of numerous disorders, short- and long-term disabilities, and diseases in different populations. Tracking health-related quality of life in different populations can identify subgroups with poor physical or mental health and can help guide policies or interventions to improve their health.

EuroQol    The Group comprises a network of international multilingual, multidisciplinary researchers, originally from seven centres in England, Finland, the Netherlands, Norway, and Sweden. The process of shared development, local experimentation and lively discussion resulted in EQ-5D, a measure generating a single index value for health status with considerable potential for use in health care evaluation.

Health Economics and Decision Science (HEDS), University of Sheffield    The purpose of HEDS is to promote excellence in national and international health care resource allocation decisions through applied and theoretical research funded by the public and private sector, and supporting the effective implementation of the results of such research through education, training, and management interventions.

Health Outcomes Assessment Program, UCSD    The University of California, San Diego, Health Outcomes Assessment Program (HOAP) is a multidisciplinary team of quality of life researchers with the common goal of improving the measurement of health outcomes and quality of life.

Health Utilities Group    The Health Utilities Group focuses on preference-based measures of health-related quality of life for describing treatment process and outcomes in clinical studies, for population health studies, and economic evaluations of health care services. The Health Utilities Index (HUI) is a generic, preference-scored, comprehensive system for measuring health status, health-related quality of life, and producing utility scores

ISOQOL     ISOQOL’s mission is the scientific study of Quality of Life relevant to health and healthcare. The Society promotes the rigorous investigation of health-related quality of life measurement from conceptualization to application and practice. ISOQOL fosters the worldwide exchange of information through scientific publications, international conferences, educational outreach, and collaborative support for HRQOL Initiatives.

Medical Outcomes Trust    The Medical Outcomes Trust is a not-for-profit organization dedicated to improving health and health care by promoting the science of outcomes measurement, and the development, evaluation, and distribution of standardized high quality instruments that measure health and the outcomes of medical care. The Trust supports the use of these instruments with services and publications.

Outcomes Research Group, Centre for Health Economics, University of York    The measurement of outcomes is fundamental to the evaluation of health care. To achieve such measurement, the impact of treatment on health status has to be described and weighted so as to produce quantitative data that can be used in cost- effectiveness analysis. The source of these weights and the methods by which they are obtained has been the subject of much research over the past 25 years. The Centre’s outcomes research group has contributed significantly to that research effort.

PROMIS    The Patient-Reported Outcomes Measurement Information System (PROMIS) aims to revolutionize the way patient-reported outcome tools are selected and employed in clinical research and practice evaluation. As part of the NIH Roadmap for Medical Research, PROMIS will work to establish a national resource for accurate and efficient measurement of patient-reported symptoms and other health outcomes in clinical practice.

ProQolid    The success of Patient Reported Outcome (PRO) and Quality of Life (QOL) studies depends a great deal on the choice of appropriate instruments. They must be selected according to the domains they measure and the populations and pathologies for which they are designed. Practical issues, such as the availability of different translations, copyrights, and access to instruments are also major criteria in the choice of instruments. ProQolid aims to identify and describe PRO and QOL instruments to help researchers choose appropriate instruments and facilitate access to them.

QualityMetric    QualityMetric was founded in 1997 by John E. Ware, Jr., principal developer of the SF-36® Health Survey. The company is a leading provider of health status and outcomes measurement products and services that use proprietary methodologies to capture, benchmark, and interpret patient-reported health information.

RAND Health    The RAND Corporation is a nonprofit research organization conducting analyses that address the challenges facing the public and private sectors around the world. Over its 35-year history, RAND Health has produced many practical surveys and tools for improving quality of care, many of which are available on this site for public use.

SF-36.org    A community for measuring health outcomes using SF tools.

Society for Medical Decision Making    The Society for Medical Decision Making’s mission is to improve health outcomes through the advancement of proactive systematic approaches to clinical decision making and policy formation in health care by providing a scholarly forum that connects and educates researchers, providers, policy-makers, and the public.