Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
. 2006 Oct 9:6:247.
doi: 10.1186/1471-2458-6-247.

Normative data and discriminative properties of short form 36 (SF-36) in Turkish urban population

Yucel Demiral  1 , Gul Ergor, Belgin Unal, Semih Semin, Yildiz Akvardar, Berna Kivircik, Köksal Alptekin
Affiliations

Normative data and discriminative properties of short form 36 (SF-36) in Turkish urban population

Yucel Demiral et al. BMC Public Health. .

Abstract

Background: SF-36 has been both translated into different languages and adapted to different cultures to obtain comparable data on health status internationally. However there have been only a limited number of studies focused on the discriminative ability of SF-36 regarding social and disease status in developing countries. The aim of this study was to obtain population norms of the short form 36 (SF-36) health survey and the association of SF-36 domains with demographic and socioeconomic variables in an urban population in Turkey.

Methods: A cross-sectional study. Face to face interviews were carried out with a sample of households. The sample was systematically selected from two urban Health Districts in Izmir, Turkey. The study group consisted of 1,279 people selected from a study population of 46,290 people aged 18 and over.

Results: Internal consistencies of the scales were high, with the exception of mental health and vitality. Physical health scales were associated with both age and gender. On the other hand, mental health scales were less strongly associated with age and gender. Women reported poorer health compared to men in general. Social risk factors (employment status, lower education and economic strain) were associated with worse health profiles. The SF-36 was found to be capable of discriminating disease status.

Conclusion: Our findings, cautiously generalisable to urban population, suggest that the SF-36 can be a valuable tool for studies on health outcomes in Turkish population. SF-36 may also be a promising measure for research on health inequalities in Turkey and other developing countries.

PubMed Disclaimer

References

    1. Ware JE, Kosinski M, Gandek B. SF-36 Health Survey Manual & interpretation guide. Lincoln, RI, Qualiymetric Incorporated; 2004.
    1. Brazier JE, Harper R, Jones NM, O'Cathain A, Thomas KJ, Usherwood T, Westlake L. Validating the SF-36 health survey questionnaire: new outcome measure for primary care. BMJ. 1992;305:160–164. - PMC - PubMed
    1. Ware JEJ, Sherbourne CD. The MOS 36-item short-form health survey (SF-36). I. Conceptual framework and item selection. Med Care. 1992;30:473–483. doi: 10.1097/00005650-199206000-00002. - DOI - PubMed
    1. Alonso J, Ferrer M, Gandek B, Ware JE, Aaronson NK, Mosconi P, Rasmussen NK, Bullinger M, Fukuhara S, Kaasa S, Leplege A. Health-related quality of life associated with chronic conditions in eight countries: Results from the International Quality of Life Assessment (IQOLA) Project. Quality of Life Research. 2004;13:283–298. doi: 10.1023/B:QURE.0000018472.46236.05. - DOI - PubMed
    1. Bullinger M, Alonso J, Apolone G, Leplege A, Sullivan M, Wood-Dauphinee S, Gandek B, Wagner A, Aaronson N, Bech P, Fukuhara S, Kaasa S, Ware JE. Translating health status questionnaires and evaluating their quality: The IQOLA project approach. Journal of Clinical Epidemiology. 1998;51:913–923. doi: 10.1016/S0895-4356(98)00082-1. - DOI - PubMed

Publication types