Self-rated health (also called Self-reported health, Self-assessed health, or perceived health) refers to both a single question such as "in general, would you say that your health is excellent, very good, good, fair, or poor?" and a survey questionnaire in which participants assess different dimensions of their own health. This survey technique is commonly used in
health research
Public health is "the science and art of preventing disease, prolonging life and promoting health through the organized efforts and informed choices of society, organizations, public and private, communities and individuals". Analyzing the det ...
for its ease of use and its power in measuring health.
Single question
Self-rated health measures the present general health and gives answer choices, typically structured like a
Likert Scale
A Likert scale ( , commonly mispronounced as ) is a psychometric scale commonly involved in research that employs questionnaires. It is the most widely used approach to scaling responses in survey research, such that the term (or more fully the ...
. The self-rated health question may take different forms. It may be formulated as "in general, would you say that you health is excellent, very good, good, fair, or poor?" as the first question in the
SF-36
The Short Form (36) Health Survey is a 36-item, patient-reported survey of patient health. The SF-36 is a measure of health status and an abbreviated variant of it, the SF-6D, is commonly used in health economics as a variable in the quality-adjus ...
questionnaire. It may also be formulated as "In general, how would you rate your health today," with the possible choices being "very good" (1), "good" (2), "moderate" (3), "bad" (4) or "very bad" (5), as used by the
World Health Organization
The World Health Organization (WHO) is a specialized agency of the United Nations responsible for international public health. The WHO Constitution states its main objective as "the attainment by all peoples of the highest possible level of h ...
. All questions do not necessarily have five answer choices; there can be more or less.
The self-rated health question is purposely vague so as to seize people's own assessment of health according to their own definition of health.
Although the answer to the self-rated health question is based on what people think—and thus is subjective—it is a statistically powerful predictor of
mortality
Mortality is the state of being mortal, or susceptible to death; the opposite of immortality.
Mortality may also refer to:
* Fish mortality, a parameter used in fisheries population dynamics to account for the loss of fish in a fish stock throug ...
in the general population
and has also been shown to predict morbidity.
Methodological strength
Validity
The strong association between self-rated health and mortality
is used as proof that this measurement is
valid, because mortality is considered as the most objective measurement of the general health of an individual.
Reliability
The self-rated health question has been found to be a reliable measurement of general health since respondents rated the same general health assessment within a period where their health was unlikely to change.
Despite the reliability of the measurement, the self-rated health question "in general, would you say that you health is excellent, very good, good, fair, or poor?" is particularly vague. Thus, this measurement has low level in reliability test than other self-rated measurements that assess a more specific aspect of health.
Questionnaires
Self-rated health, as measured by a questionnaire, attempts to measure health in all its dimensions. In such a questionnaire, participants answer a series of questions which are typically structured using a
Likert Scale
A Likert scale ( , commonly mispronounced as ) is a psychometric scale commonly involved in research that employs questionnaires. It is the most widely used approach to scaling responses in survey research, such that the term (or more fully the ...
. The
SF-36
The Short Form (36) Health Survey is a 36-item, patient-reported survey of patient health. The SF-36 is a measure of health status and an abbreviated variant of it, the SF-6D, is commonly used in health economics as a variable in the quality-adjus ...
questionnaire is an example of tool for self-assessed overall health. The SF-36 questionnaire addresses several dimensions of physical and mental health.
Uses of self-rated health
Considering that self-reported health is a powerful predictor of mortality
and considering its easy application, this subjective measure of health is often used in
health research
Public health is "the science and art of preventing disease, prolonging life and promoting health through the organized efforts and informed choices of society, organizations, public and private, communities and individuals". Analyzing the det ...
and large-scale surveys.
This measure helps follow the evolution of health across time and between populations.
Publication
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See also
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Behavioral medicine Behavioral medicine is concerned with the integration of knowledge in the biological, behavioral, psychological, and social sciences relevant to health and illness. These sciences include epidemiology, anthropology, sociology, psychology, physiolo ...
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Chronic illness
A chronic condition is a health condition or disease that is persistent or otherwise long-lasting in its effects or a disease that comes with time. The term ''chronic'' is often applied when the course of the disease lasts for more than three mo ...
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Global Forum for Health Research The Global Forum for Health Research is an international foundation headquartered in Geneva, Switzerland, established in 1997 to increase the amount of research into global health issues. It coined the phrase 10/90 gap to identify the observation t ...
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Health
Health, according to the World Health Organization, is "a state of complete physical, mental and social well-being and not merely the absence of disease and infirmity".World Health Organization. (2006)''Constitution of the World Health Organiza ...
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Health promotion
Health promotion is, as stated in the 1986 World Health Organization (WHO) Ottawa Charter for Health Promotion, the "process of enabling people to increase control over, and to improve their health."
Scope
The WHO's 1986 Ottawa Charter for Healt ...
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Malaise
As a medical term, malaise is a feeling of general discomfort, uneasiness or lack of wellbeing and often the first sign of an infection or other disease. The word has existed in French since at least the 12th century.
The term is often used ...
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Severity of illness Severity of illness (SOI) is defined as the extent of organ system derangement or physiologic decompensation for a patient. It gives a medical classification into minor, moderate, major, and extreme. The SOI class is meant to provide a basis for eva ...
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Sickness behavior
350px, Ancher, Michael, "The Sick Girl", 1882, Statens Museum for Kunst
Sickness behavior is a coordinated set of adaptive behavioral changes that develop in ill individuals during the course of an infection.
They usually, but not always, accom ...
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Stress (biology)
Stress, either physiological, biological or psychological, is an organism's response to a stressor such as an environmental condition. Stress is the body's method of reacting to a condition such as a threat, challenge or physical and psycho ...
References
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Health research