The objective of this article was to give a conceptual survey of old and new measures for a nation's state of health with special focus on new measures seeking to combine mortality with morbidity, functional, and quality of life dimensions. Internationally, the development has given rise to two different movements. One (represented by Denmark and the rest of the EU) aims to develop a large number of standardized indicators, whereas the other (represented by the WHO and the World Bank) builds on the idea that it must be possible to combine the many indicators into a single summary measure for a nation's state of health. In the summary measures, distinction is made between health expectancy and health gap measures. Attention is given to reviewing DALY (disability-adjusted life years), disability weighting, and the social value choices applied in WHO's World Health Report 2000.

Denmark↗

PubMed2003

[The scientific committee system].

Since 1992 a law based national system of Scientific Ethical Committees has existed. It consists of regional committees supplemented with a Central Committee. The Danish model is characterised by having a majority of lay people in all committees. The law is based on the principle of informed consent. A new law in 2003 will implement the EU directive on Good Clinical Practice. A maximum time of 60 days for the approval of biomedical research projects and approval of multi-centre trials at only one scientific ethical committee will be introduced.

Clinical Trials as Topic↗

PubMed2002

Summary measures of population health. An overview.

The objective of the paper is to give a conceptual overview of old and new measures of a nation's state of health with special focus on new measures seeking to combine mortality with morbidity, functional and quality of life dimensions. Internationally, the development has given rise to two different movements. One (in Denmark and the EU) aims to develop a large number of standardised indicators, while the other (the WHO and the World Bank) builds on the idea that it must be possible to combine the many indicators into a single summary measure of a nation's state of health. In the summary measures, distinction is made between health expectancies and health gap measures. Attention is given to reviewing DALY (disability-adjusted life years), disability weights, and the social value choices applied in WHO's World Health Report 2000.

Health Status Indicators↗