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ABSTRACT: Objectives
Investigate how religion may affect the perception of health states among adults in the United Arab Emirates and the implications for research on self-reported health and quality of life and the use of values in cost-effectiveness analysis.Design
Qualitative analysis of short-structured interviews with adult Emiratis carried out by a market research agency.The COREQ criteria have been used where appropriate to guide the reporting of our findings.Setting
Participants were recruited from shopping malls and other public places in the cities of Al Ain and Abu Dhabi.Participants
Two hundred adult Emiratis broadly representative of the Emirati population in terms of age and gender.Results
Eighty one per cent of participants said that their perception of health states was influenced by their spiritual or religious beliefs. The two overarching themes that seemed to explain or classify these influences were 'fatalism' and 'preservation of life'. Subthemes included powerlessness to change what is preordained by God, fear of disability (particularly diminished mobility) and appreciation of health and life and the requirement to look after one's health. A final theme was that of acceptance, with respondents expressing a willingness to endure suffering and disability with patience in the expectation of rewards in the hereafter.Conclusions
Our results emphasise the need for further work to establish locally relevant value sets for Muslim majority countries in the Middle East and elsewhere for use in health technology assessment decision-making, rather than relying on value sets from other regions.
SUBMITTER: Elbarazi I
PROVIDER: S-EPMC5640057 | biostudies-literature | 2017 Oct
REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature
Elbarazi Iffat I Devlin Nancy J NJ Katsaiti Marina-Selini MS Papadimitropoulos Emmanuel A EA Shah Koonal K KK Blair Iain I
BMJ open 20171005 10
<h4>Objectives</h4>Investigate how religion may affect the perception of health states among adults in the United Arab Emirates and the implications for research on self-reported health and quality of life and the use of values in cost-effectiveness analysis.<h4>Design</h4>Qualitative analysis of short-structured interviews with adult Emiratis carried out by a market research agency.The COREQ criteria have been used where appropriate to guide the reporting of our findings.<h4>Setting</h4>Partici ...[more]