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Over the past two decades increasing moves towards' measuring'health outcome have influenced much of health care and indeed much of the physiotherapy profession, However, health outcome measures can have multiple purposes, are associated with evolving and sometimes confusing terminology, and may have perceived and actual barriers to use. As a result the level of understanding and incorporation into physiotherapy practice is variable despite increasing national and international professional guidelines. In order to appropriately understand and use outcome measures (as well as interpret the information from them), it is essential to consider three key areas covered in this paper: conceptual frameworks to place an outcome measure within, practical considerations regarding implementation and finally identifying and describing the measurement qualities of an outcome measure; its psychometric properties.