What does DALY stand for and what does it measure?

• A. Disability-adjusted life year; measures hospital expenditure.
• B. Disability-adjusted life year; measures life expectancy.
• C. Disability-adjusted life year; measures the overall burden of disease by combining years of life lost and years lived with disability.
• D. Disability-adjusted life year; measures height.

Answer: (C)

DALY stands for disability-adjusted life year. It measures the overall burden of disease by combining years of life lost due to premature death and years lived with disability, with the disability portion weighted by severity. This yields a single statistic that reflects both fatal and non-fatal health outcomes, allowing meaningful comparisons across conditions and populations. It does not track hospital spending, life expectancy alone, or physical height—the metric is about disease impact on a population, not costs or simple longevity.