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Quality of Life and Subjective Health: Strengthening the Subjective Perspective in Cardiology

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Handbook of Cardiovascular Behavioral Medicine

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Abstract

The concept of quality of life provides a framework for better integration of the patient’s subjective health perspective into medical care. Quality of life is determined by multiple medical and nonmedical factors and requires multidimensional assessment. Health-related quality of life or subjective health can be measured by a variety of validated generic or disease-specific scales, typically resulting in multidimensional profiles. Many of these scales have been tested and used in cardiac patients, and some disease-specific instruments are available to study typical subjective effects of, e.g., coronary heart disease or heart failure. Reducing the multiple dimensions of quality of life to single numeric values runs the risk of losing the facets of quality of life relevant to individual patients. However, simple summary or utility scores, such as quality-adjusted life years (QALYs), are useful for comparing groups of persons or treatments and are frequently applied in health economy. This chapter gives an introduction into the history and concepts of quality of life in medicine. It describes general principles and common instruments for assessing quality of life and summarizes clinical studies addressing quality of life in cardiac patients.

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Psychosomatic Medicine and Psychotherapy, University of Göttingen Medical Center, Göttingen, Germany

    Christoph Herrmann-Lingen

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  1. Christoph Herrmann-Lingen
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Correspondence to Christoph Herrmann-Lingen .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Psychology, University of Maryland, Baltimore County, Baltimore, MD, USA

    Shari R. Waldstein

  2. Department of Medical and Clinical Psychology, Tilburg University, Tilburg, The Netherlands

    Willem J. Kop

  3. Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences, Duke University Medical Center, Durham, NC, USA

    Edward C. Suarez

  4. Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences, University of Oklahoma Health Sciences Center, Oklahoma City, OK, USA

    William R. Lovallo

  5. Division of Gerontology Geriatrics and Palliative Medicine Department of Medicine, University of Maryland School of Medicine, Baltimore, MD, USA

    Leslie I. Katzel

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© 2022 The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Science+Business Media, LLC, part of Springer Nature

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Herrmann-Lingen, C. (2022). Quality of Life and Subjective Health: Strengthening the Subjective Perspective in Cardiology. In: Waldstein, S.R., Kop, W.J., Suarez, E.C., Lovallo, W.R., Katzel, L.I. (eds) Handbook of Cardiovascular Behavioral Medicine. Springer, New York, NY. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-0-387-85960-6_56

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