Generating Utilities for the Château-Santé Base: A Novel, Generic, and Patient-Centered Health-Outcome Measure

Objectives

We have developed a new patient-centered, preference-based generic health-outcome measure, Château-Santé Base (CS-Base), which is based on a novel multiattribute preference response (MAPR) measurement framework. This study aimed to generate a first utility set for the CS-Base, making it suitable for use in health-economic evaluations.

Methods

CS-Base comprises 12 health attributes: mobility, vision, hearing, cognition, mood, anxiety, pain, fatigue, social functioning, daily activities, self-esteem, and independence, each with 4 levels. Our methodology to generate utilities for the CS-Base was 2-fold. First, we derived coefficients from patient MAPR data to calculate CS-Base values. Subsequently, these were normalized to a 0.0 to 1.0 utility scale, in which 0.0 signifies dead. The dead position was estimated using general population data from a discrete choice experiment (discrete choice experiment + dead), using a division-value strategy, which localize the position of states better or worse than dead.

Results

We analyzed MAPR data from 3222 patients and discrete choice experiment + dead data from 1995 respondents. All MAPR coefficients were negative, logically ordered, and significantly different from the reference level. The dead position was denoted by a division value of −148.385. Utility values spanned from −0.071 to 1.0, and only 53 of 16 777 216 states were deemed worse than dead.

Conclusions

This study introduced the first CS-Base utility set, underlining a 2-step utility derivation method. This method, blending societal and patient views, surpasses traditional preference-based approaches, yielding firmer results. However, improvement of the normalization procedure is expected. Estimating CS-Base utilities is an ongoing process that gains precision over time.