Creating a Health Utility value for Birdshot Chorioretinopathy

Birdshot Chorioretinopathy (BCR) is a potentially blinding condition which affects an estimated 400-500 people in the UK. There is currently very limited research on the quality of life experienced by those with birdshot Chorioretinopathy.

Health utility values are widely used in medical research, to measure the impact of a condition on the quality of life for patients. Questions are combined with other measurements in order to help form a picture of a patient’s estimate of their overall health state or ‘health utility value’.

Ms Helen Southworth from the University Hospitals Birmingham NHS Foundation Trust, will be calculating these ‘health utility values’ for Birdshot Chorioretinopathy. This has not been done previously.

Patients will be recruited into the study from the birdshot clinics at Queen Elizabeth Hospital, Birmingham. They will be asked to complete several questionnaires. The combination of their answers and their test results will be analysed to look for associations between the questionnaires’ results and the results of clinical tests.

By identifying the effect Birdshot Chorioretinopathy has on patients’ quality of life, it would help with the rethinking of how we manage patients.