Abstract

Objective

The main purpose of this study is to provide a national catalog of preference-based utility weights associated with major chronic diseases in Korea.

Methods

The 2005 Korea National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey was used to get EQ-5D scores for 27 major chronic diseases. The independent detrimental effect of each chronic disease was estimated using a censored least absolute deviations regression.

Results

The respondents (60.5%) rated their health as perfect or 11111 on the EQ-5D scale showing ceiling effect. Stroke (0.5067∼0.5756) was the condition of the lowest EQ-5D utility weight and was followed by renal failure (0.6637∼0.7739), angina pectoris (0.7325∼0.8364), and arthritis (0.7621∼0.8644). The marginal impact of each chronic disease after adjusting for age, sex, education, income, marital status, and the number of comorbid conditions was largest in stroke, arthritis, cancer, renal failure, and herniated disc.

Conclusion

This study provided a nationally representative catalog of utility weights for major chronic diseases in Korea. The three most burdensome chronic diseases among Korean adults based on the regression analysis were stroke, arthritis, and cancer.