12-Item Short Form Survey from the RAND Medical Outcomes Study
The 12-Item Short Form Health Survey (SF-12) was developed for the Medical Outcomes Study (MOS), a multi-year study of patients with chronic conditions. The resulting short-form survey instrument provides a solution to the problem faced by many investigators who must restrict survey length. The instrument was designed to reduce respondent burden while achieving minimum standards of precision for purposes of group comparisons involving multiple health dimensions.
The SF-12 is not available on the RAND Health website. Use of the SF-12 is governed by QualityMetric, which has no affiliation with RAND. RAND Health has put the following MOS short form health surveys in the public domain for non-commercial use, by posting them on the RAND Health Website:
Available documents:
Scoring Instructions for MOS 12-Item Short Form Survey Instrument (SF-12)
Scoring instructions at www.ucla.edu, under "Other helpful programs"
Related Reading
Measuring Function and Well-Being: The Medical Outcomes Study Approach — 1992
User's Manual for Medical Outcomes Study (MOS) Core Measures of Health-Related Quality of Life — 2005
This manual summarizes the MOS measures and presents psychometric results from the MOS. It is designed to be a companion to the book, Measuring Function and Well-Being: The Medical Outcomes Study Approach.
Other instruments from the Medical Outcomes Study
This website offers a list of all instruments that have been approved by the Scientific Advisory Committee of the Medical Outcomes Trust.
See other instruments at outcomes-trust.org
The Veterans RAND 12 Item Health Survey (VR12): What is it and How it is Used — 2009
Center for Health Quality, Outcomes, and Economic Research, A Health Services Research and Development Center of Excellence, VA Medical Center, Bedford, MA, USA,
Bibliography for the Medical Outcomes Study (MOS)
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