Health Overview

Scale Analysis

Developed in the late 1980s by European researchers, the EQ-5D is based on a system that measures five core dimensions of quality of life.

Purpose

The primary purpose of this questionnaire is to assess both the quality of life and the general health status of individuals.

Question Scoring

The EQ-5D includes 5 questions, each corresponding to a distinct dimension of health: mobility, self-care, usual activities, pain/discomfort, and anxiety/depression. Each question is answered using three levels (no problem, moderate problem, extreme problem/disability), allowing for 243 possible health states.

The first part of the questionnaire is a descriptive tool, where each dimension is rated across five severity levels (no problems, slight problems, moderate problems, severe problems, extreme problems). The second part uses a visual analog scale (VAS), ranging from 1 to 100, to evaluate the individual’s overall health status.

Statistical Analysis

Completing the questionnaire yields a 5-digit code representing the individual’s health state, with each digit corresponding to one of the five dimensions and taking a value from 1 to 5. The best possible health state is coded as 11111, and the worst as 55555. This descriptive scoring system can be converted into an index value following the guidelines provided by the instrument’s developers.

Validity and Reliability

The EQ-5D has been translated into numerous languages and is considered one of the most valid tools for measuring quality of life. It is suitable for use with both patient populations and the general public. The tool has been translated and standardized in Greek by Yfantopoulos G. and Sarris M.

References

Translation: Yfantopoulos G. and Sarris M.
Keywords: Health overview, EQ-5D EuroQol, validity, reliability