Measuring population health: Correlates of the health utilities index among English and French Canadians

This study used cross-sectional data from the 1994/95 National Population H ealth Survey (NPHS) in Canada. The objective of the study was to examine th e relationship between several established correlates of health status in t he general population and the Health Utilities Index (HUI), a multi- dimens ional, preference-based measure of health status. Analyses were carried out separately for the English-speaking (n=9,853) and French-speaking (n=1,513 ) respondents. The index correlated strongly with self ratings of health st atus and functional disability and varied as expected according to age, sex , and income. Subjects classified to different categories of chronic condit ions reported different levels of health, as predicted. The HUI was also as sociated with the use of drugs and recent history of hospitalization. No ma jor differences in the findings were observed,between the two cultural grou ps. The results should be treated with caution due to the cross-sectional d esign and other methodological limitations of the study.