Developing a summary measure of medical status

Health status surveys and assessments typically obtain detailed information on specific physical health conditions. While such specific details are im portant, it is frequently also valuable to have ct summarized evaluation of medical conditions which can be used to compare subjects, or for statistic al analyses. Using data from the Duke Established Populations for Epidemiol ogic Studies of the Elderly survey, vie indicate how to obtain a weighted s um of chronic medical conditions. Like the sum of the same conditions, it e xplains variance in selected measures of health service use and health stat us, in some instances making a contribution beyond that of the summed measu re. It is a significantly better predictor of mortality within six years. ( C) 1998, Editrice Kurtis.