12 July 2019 - Generic preference-based measures of health-related quality of life are widely used as outcome measures in cost-effectiveness and cost-utility analyses (CEA, CUA). 

Health technology assessment agencies favour generic preference based (GPB) measures because they facilitate comparisons among conditions and because the scoring functions for these measures are based on community preferences. However, there is no gold standard health-related quality of life (HRQL) measure, scores generated by GPB measures may differ importantly, and changes in scores may fail to detect important changes in HRQL. 

Therefore, to enhance the accumulation of empirical evidence on how well GPB measures perform, we advocate that investigators routinely use two (or more) GPB measures in each study.

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