Piloting quality of life questionnaires to measure capability wellbeing to inform commissioning

CLAHRC West is finalising a research collaboration agreement with Gloucestershire CCG to pilot quality of life questionnaires that measure a person’s capability wellbeing, and using them to inform outcome-based commissioning.

To maximise patient health and wellbeing benefits from limited resources, outcomes across the health and social care system must be compared. Generic quality of life questionnaires are useful in this scenario, but the standard approach of measuring health-related quality of life to generate quality-adjusted life years by health economists is not holistic enough to inform commissioning across health and social care.

‘Capability wellbeing’ measures, such as ICECAP, that ask questions about a person’s quality of life in terms of their ability to have independence, love and friendship and enjoyment in their life, have been recently developed for this purpose.

This project looks at the feasibility of collecting and analysing capability wellbeing measures across a number of pilots in different patient groups and settings in Gloucestershire. It will involve quantitative analysis of the patient completed capability wellbeing measures for these pilot groups. It will also involve qualitative analysis by conducting interviews with patients, clinical professionals and commissioners, to develop a greater understanding of the feasibility and acceptability of collecting the measures with patients, as well as the usefulness of the data collected for outcome-based commissioning by Gloucestershire CCG.