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A novel health metric based on biomarkers

Author

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  • Qing Li

    (PRIMUS, University of Sherbrooke)

  • Alain A. Cohen

    (Department of Family Medicine, University of Sherbrooke)

  • Linda P. Fried

    (Mailman School of Public Health, Columbia University)

Abstract

We propose a biomarker-based, objective and continuously distributed health measure which is novel to the economics literature. Using 41 commonly available biomarkers in two leading biomarker databases, we consider the individuals as points in a 41-dimensional biomarker space and measure their objective health as the Mahalanobis distance to the centroid of a reference group. In this way the centroid of the reference group represents an "ideal state" of health, and a bigger distance from this centroid indicates worse health. We validate versions of our health measure using di¤erent number of biomarkers and through the link with a commonly used measure of general health (self-reported health); we nd that our health measure is positively but not perfectly linked to self-reported health. Additionally, we nd that the signal of health increases with the number of biomarkers included; nonetheless, it is clearly feasible to have a signal with fewer biomarkers though the signal could be weaker. Finally we illustrate our health measure in two applications: 1) the estimation of health distribution where we nd a long tail representing individuals in very bad health; 2) the concentration index where we can truly satisfy the requirement for continuously de ned general health.

Suggested Citation

  • Qing Li & Alain A. Cohen & Linda P. Fried, 2017. "A novel health metric based on biomarkers," Cahiers de recherche 17-08, Departement d'économique de l'École de gestion à l'Université de Sherbrooke.
    • Handle: RePEc:shr:wpaper:17-08
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    File URL: http://gredi.recherche.usherbrooke.ca/wpapers/GREDI-1708.pdf
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    Keywords

    comparative advantage; physical capital; hurricanes.;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • F14 - International Economics - - Trade - - - Empirical Studies of Trade
    • O10 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Economic Development - - - General
    • Q54 - Agricultural and Natural Resource Economics; Environmental and Ecological Economics - - Environmental Economics - - - Climate; Natural Disasters and their Management; Global Warming

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