15 Best Health Survey Questions
What are the best health survey questions?
- How healthy would you consider yourself on a scale of 1-10?
- Does your family have any history of hereditary disease? What are they?
- Do you have any chronic diseases?
- Do you take any drugs?
- Do you drink alcohol? If so, how often?
- Do you smoke? If so, how much?
- How often do you do a health check-up?
- Have your physical or emotional health interfered with your daily activities?
- How much pain have you experienced in the past 4 weeks?
- How much did the pain affect your daily activities?
- Have you experienced emotional problems that affect your work?
- In the past 4 weeks, what has been the impact of your physical and emotional health on your social activities?
- Have you taken any medications in the last 24 hours? What are they?
- How did you take these medications?
- Which health insurance provider are you enrolled with?
If you’ve ever been to the doctor’s office or hospital, then you’ve most likely taken a health survey. These surveys are used to find out about the state of your health, physical and mental, and general well-being. They are not only used by hospitals and clinics — but they are also used by local governments to assess the population’s health and companies and businesses.
To get the most information out of these surveys, you need to ask the best health survey questions. It’s important to structure these surveys in a way that tackles the most important aspects of a person’s health.
Before we get to the questions themselves, let’s talk about why they are important.
Importance of Health Surveys
Health surveys give information about the general population. Governments use them to assess the overall state of the population’s health, risk factors, health behavior, and quality of health care. This will help them figure out the weaknesses of the health sector and decide what actions are necessary.
Healthcare providers conduct these surveys to make their services better. Their surveys are not limited to taking the patient’s health history, but they also have surveys about their satisfaction. Surveys improve healthcare because it gives the providers feedback from the patients themselves. They learn about what needs improvement with their system and how to do it.
For businesses, health surveys became necessary when the pandemic hit. Those businesses where customers are physically present, like restaurants and convenience stores, need to ensure that their customers are healthy. They conduct a kind of health survey through questionnaires before they enter the premises. This protects employees and the business in general against liabilities.
Employers may also conduct health surveys to determine whether their employees are staying healthy. It could help with the decision on whether or not it’s safe to go back to the office or not.
Best Health Survey Questions
An effective health survey should yield a good summary of each respondent’s and the general population’s health. Choosing survey questions carefully is crucial. If you want information on a specific condition, you should conduct more targeted surveys (like the COVID-19 questionnaires). If you need more general data, you can refer to the questions we’ve prepared below.
When creating a health survey, you should consider the target respondents and what information you need to collect. For example, the best questions for a COVID questionnaire for businesses could contain:
Have you experienced any of these COVID-19 symptoms for the past 14 days?
- Fever
- Cough
- Sore throat
- Shortness of breath
- Loss of taste and smell
- Chills
- Headaches
- Diarrhea
Have you been in close contact with anyone who tested positive for COVID-19?
Have you tested positive for COVID-19?
Have you traveled outside of the Philippines in the past 14 days
Are you currently waiting for the COVID-19 test results?
For more general health concerns, the best health survey questions should be able to create a complete health profile for all who take them. Some good examples are the standard SF-36 health questionnaire and version 2.0 of the same questionnaire. These questionnaires are for general use and have 36 and 12 questions respectively. It has been used to assess population health and compare the emergence of diseases, health benefits, and other factors.
Partly based on the questionnaires, the following are some questions that should always be part of your health surveys:
- How healthy would you consider yourself on a scale of 1-10?
- Does your family have any history of hereditary disease? What are they?
- Do you have any chronic diseases?
- Do you take any drugs?
- Do you drink alcohol? If so, how often?
- Do you smoke? If so, how much?
- How often do you do a health check-up?
- Have your physical or emotional health interfered with your daily activities?
- How much pain have you experienced in the past 4 weeks?
- How much did the pain affect your daily activities?
- Have you experienced emotional problems that affect your work?
- In the past 4 weeks, what has been the impact of your physical and emotional health on your social activities?
- Have you taken any medications in the last 24 hours? What are they?
- How did you take these medications?
- Which health insurance provider are you enrolled with?
Surveys are best conducted with multiple-choice questions, so make sure to give them the appropriate choices in your survey. With the above questions, the researcher should get a clear idea of the respondent’s overall health and well-being.
Key Takeaway
The importance of health surveys has skyrocketed with the global health emergency going on, and the questions will determine the effectiveness of the surveys. By asking the right questions, governments, healthcare providers, and even businesses will get the information they need to know what actions to take.
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