Carer Social Care-Related Quality of Life Outcomes: Estimating English Preference Weights for the Adult Social Care Outcomes Toolkit for Carers

Background:There is increasing interest in assessing the effects of interventions on older people, people with long-termconditions and their informal carers for use in economic evaluation. The Adult Social Care Outcomes Toolkit for Carers(ASCOT-Carer) is a measure that specifically assesses the impact of social care services on informal carers. To date, the ASCOT-Carer has not been preference-weighted.
Objectives:To estimate preference-based index values for the English version of the ASCOT-Carer from the general populationin England.
Methods:The ASCOT-Carer consists of 7 domains, each reflecting aspects of social care-related quality of life in informalcarers. Preferences for the ASCOT-Carer social care-related quality of life states were estimated using a best–worst scalingexercise in an online survey. The survey was administered to a sample of the general adult population in England(n = 1000). Participants were asked to put themselves into the hypothetical state of being an informal carer and indicatewhich attribute they thought was the best (first and second) and worst (first and second) from a profile list of 7 attributesreflecting the 7 domains, each ranging at a different level (1-4). Multinomial logit regression was used to analyze the dataand estimate preference weights for the ASCOT-Carer measure.
Results:The most valued aspect by English participants was the 'occupation' attribute at its highest level. Results furthershowed participants rated having no control over their daily life as the lowest attribute-level of all those presented. Theposition of the 7 attributes influenced participants’best and worst choices, and there was evidence of both scale and tasteheterogeneity on preferences.
Conclusion:This study has established a set of preference-based index values for the ASCOT-Carer in England derived from thebest–worst scaling exercise that can be used for economic evaluation of interventions on older individuals and their informalcarers.