PATIENTS-ORIENTED OUTCOME ASSESSMENT IN M USCULOSKELETAL DISEASE - OVERVIEW OF CURRENT INSTRUMENTS

Quality of life and patient-centered health status has received increa sing attention during the last decade. Simultaneously, there have been multiple instruments to assess quality of life in a standardized way. There are several possible approaches to assess health status in a mo re standardized way: (1) the judgement of a health professional, (2) p erforming standardized activities by the patient, and (3) self report of patients with standardized questionnaires. This paper presents a se lection of health status instruments that have been used successfully to assess health-related quality of life in patients with musculoskele tal diseases. The description is restricted to instruments that have s ound psychometric properties and that have been published in the scien tific literature.