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The Healthy-years Equivalents

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  • Abraham Mehrez
  • Amiram Gafni

Abstract

The healthy-years equivalent (HYE) is a measure of outcome of health care programs that combines two outcomes of interest: quality of life and quantity of life. Unlike QALYs (quality- adjusted life years) HYEs fully represent patients' (or other individuals') preferences, as a result of the way they are calculated from each individual's utility function. The authors suggest an algorithm to measure the HYE of any given lifetime health profile. The algorithm is based on the classic standard gamble method to measure individuals' preferences under uncertainty, and consists of two lottery questions. Algorithms for the general case (any given lifetime health profile) and a simpler case—the chronic health state case—are provided, as is a modification of the algorithm aimed at shortening the length of the interview when an individual is faced with many possible lifetime health profiles. In addition, two questions are addressed. The first is theoretical and deals with the existence of HYE: do all lifetime health profiles, which are preferred to death, have hypothetical equivalents that can be measured in healthy years? The second is empirical and deals with the reproducibility of the measures obtained by using the measurement technique suggested. This is needed because the technique employs a combination of lottery questions that had not previously been used together. The results of an experiment performed to test the reproducibility of the measures were satisfactory. (Med Decis Making 1991;11:140-146)

Suggested Citation

  • Abraham Mehrez & Amiram Gafni, 1991. "The Healthy-years Equivalents," Medical Decision Making, , vol. 11(2), pages 140-146, June.
    • Handle: RePEc:sae:medema:v:11:y:1991:i:2:p:140-146
    DOI: 10.1177/0272989X9101100212
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    Citations

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    Cited by:

    1. Catherine Buron & Catherine Le Galès & Anne-Marie Fericelli, 1997. "L'indicateur QALYs à la lumière de la théorie de l'utilité espérée multi-attribut explicitement décomposée," Économie et Prévision, Programme National Persée, vol. 129(3), pages 55-71.
    2. Bleichrodt, Han, 1995. "QALYs and HYEs: Under what conditions are they equivalent?," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 14(1), pages 17-37, May.
    3. Morrison, Gwendolyn C., 1997. "HYE and TTO: What is the difference?," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 16(5), pages 563-578, October.
    4. Johannesson, Magnus, 1995. "Quality-adjusted life-years versus healthy-years equivalents -- A comment," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 14(1), pages 9-16, May.
    5. Afschin Gandjour, 2008. "Incorporating feelings related to the uncertainty about future health in utility measurement," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 17(10), pages 1207-1213, October.
    6. Ried, Walter, 1998. "QALYs versus HYEs--what's right and what's wrong. A review of the controversy," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 17(5), pages 607-625, October.
    7. Gordon B. Hazen, 2007. "Adding Extrinsic Goals to the Quality-Adjusted Life Year Model," Decision Analysis, INFORMS, vol. 4(1), pages 3-16, March.
    8. Christelle Garrouste & Cyrille Piatecki & Yvan Stroppa, 2021. "Matching dynamics and optima in a multi-agents labor market setting, 2015," Working Papers hal-03245585, HAL.
    9. Ried, Walter, 1996. "QALYs versus HYEs - What's Right and What's Wrong," Discussion Papers 544, Institut fuer Volkswirtschaftslehre und Statistik, Abteilung fuer Volkswirtschaftslehre.
    10. Lisa Prosser & James Hammitt & Ron Keren, 2007. "Measuring Health Preferences for Use in Cost-Utility and Cost-Benefit Analyses of Interventions in Children," PharmacoEconomics, Springer, vol. 25(9), pages 713-726, September.

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