Principles of Public Health Exam 1

DALYs measure the burden of disease by counting years of healthy life lost due to premature death and due to disability, with disability weighted by severity. QALYs, on the other hand, quantify the value of health outcomes by weighting each year of life by a quality-of-life utility, and are used to evaluate the impact of health interventions. So the correct statement captures that DALYs reflect years of healthy life lost, while QALYs reflect years of life adjusted by quality of life for interventions. In practice, DALYs (YLL plus YLD) describe population-level disease burden, whereas QALYs are used in economic evaluations to compare the value of different health care actions. The other options mischaracterize DALYs as simply “years of life adjusted by quality” (that describes QALYs), or assign DALYs to economic cost or environmental impact, or claim they measure the same concept.