ASSESSING PATIENT PREFERENCES FOR VISUAL ACUITY LOSS

描述：（申请人的摘要）干预措施提供的益处， 预防或治疗视力障碍主要反映质量的提高 而不是寿命的长短。 拟议项目的总体目标是 测量和描述各种眼科疾病对 生活质量 W将通过评估患者的生活质量来衡量生活质量。 公用事业。 因为效用是对患者 健康状况的偏好，它们提供了一种评估 健康干预措施提供的健康益处。 具体来说，正式 成本效益分析等方法依赖于公用事业来量化 干预措施对生活质量的影响。 拟议项目的主要具体目标是描述 各种眼病（因此，治疗的潜在益处和 预防）的效用单位。 为了实现这一目标，我们将评估 效用，临床参数（例如，视敏度）和功能（例如， 国家眼科研究所的25个问题的视觉功能问卷，或 NEI VFQ）在600名患者中，每名患者患有六种目标眼病之一 （白内障、糖尿病视网膜病变、年龄相关性黄斑变性、CMV 视网膜炎、葡萄膜炎和青光眼），以及100例无眼病的患者 除了屈光不正。 此外，我们将调查：（1） 类似严重眼病患者的效用差异，（2） 不同眼疾患者的效用差异， 调整视力和其他临床指标的差异，以及 (3)可能预测患者对眼病的效用，包括 疾病相关因素（例如，疾病的严重程度），视觉 功能（例如，NEI VFQ），以及社会人口因素（例如， 就业）。 在拟议的研究中收集的数据将提供重要的资源 临床医生、政策制定者和研究人员寻求正式评估 眼病和干预措施对生活质量的影响。 理性 临床和政策决策需要权衡：健康 所考虑的干预措施的好处是否值得冒风险和付出代价？ 拟议的项目将提供对评估至关重要的信息 治疗眼疾的全部益处，因此将有助于 患者和临床医生评估治疗的风险和益处， 眼疾。

DESCRIPTION:(Applicant's Abstract) The benefit offered by interventions that prevent or treat visual impairments primarily reflect gains in quality rather than length of life. The broad objective of the proposed project is to measure and characterize the impact of a variety of eye diseases on quality of life. W will measure quality of life by assessing patients' utilities. Because utilities are quantitative measures of patient preferences for health states, they offer a means to evaluate the magnitude of health benefit offered by health interventions. Specifically, formal methods such as cost-effectiveness analysis rely on utilities to quantify the effects of interventions on quality of life. The primary specific aim of the proposed project is to describe the burden of various eye diseases (and thus the potential benefit of treatment and prevention) in units of utility. To accomplish this aim, we will assess utilities, clinical parameters (e.g., visual acuity) and functioning (e.g., th National Eye Institute's 25 question Visual Functioning Questionnaire, or NEI VFQ) in 600 patients, each with one of six target eye diseases (cataract, diabetic retinopathy, age-related macular degeneration, CMV retinitis, uveitis and glaucoma), and in 100 patients with no eye disease other than refractive error. In addition, we will investigate: (1) the variation in utilities among patients with similarly severe eye disease, (2) the variation in utilities across patients with different eye diseases, adjusting for differences in visual acuity and other clinical measures, and (3) possible predictors for patients' utilities for eye disease, including disease-related factors (e.g., severity of disease), level of visual functioning (e.g., the NEI VFQ), and sociodemographic factors (e.g., employment). The data collected in the proposed study will provide an important resource fo clinicians, policy makers and researchers seeking to evaluate formally the impacts of eye disease and interventions on quality of life. Rational clinical and policy decision making requires tradeoffs: are the health benefits of the intervention under consideration worth the risks and costs? The proposed project will provide information that is essential to evaluate the full benefi of treatment of eye disease, and will therefore help patients and clinicians evaluate the risks and benefits of treatments for eye disease.