A DALY combines which of the following components?

• A. Incidence and prevalence
• B. Costs and resource use
• C. Years of life lost due to premature mortality and years lived with disability
• D. Hospital days and outpatient visits

Answer: (C)

DALYs measure the burden of disease by combining mortality and morbidity into a single metric, representing the total healthy life years lost. It does this by adding years of life lost due to premature mortality to years lived with disability. Years of life lost come from deaths occurring earlier than expected, while years lived with disability are the time people live with health problems weighted by their severity. So the total DALY = years of life lost + years lived with disability. This encapsulates both dying early and living with illness as part of the same burden metric. Other choices describe different ideas: incidence and prevalence track how often a condition occurs in a population, costs and resource use reflect economic impact, and hospital days/outpatient visits measure health care utilization rather than the overall loss of healthy life.