How Can a Valid Research Agenda for Patient-Reported Outcomes Be Defined Without Patient Input? Comment/Article

Commentary (partial view)
JAMA Network
 Patient-centered outcomes research (PCOR) seeks to improve the quality of health care by ensuring that patients’ values and preferences are included in the research process. Methods to incorporate patient-reported outcomes (PROs) along with other clinical metrics are central to effective PCOR strategies.² Crude markers of success are insufficient: patients likely care about 30-day mortality, but longer-term survival, functional outcome, and quality of life are paramount.³ As experienced researchers funded by the Patient Centered Outcomes Research Institute, we greatly appreciate the timely research agenda developed by Pezold and colleagues.⁴ We applaud their foresight to convene an inaugural Patient-Reported Outcomes in Surgery Conference. Although their methods were mostly sound, we question the validity of the proposed research agenda because of 1 major oversight.

Original Investigation | July 20, 2016

Defining a Research Agenda for Patient-Reported Outcomes in Surgery Using a Delphi Survey of Stakeholders

Importance  Identifying timely and important research questions using relevant patient-reported outcomes (PROs) in surgery remains paramount in the current medical climate. The inaugural Patient-Reported Outcomes in Surgery (PROS) Conference brought together stakeholders in PROs research in surgery with the aim of creating a research agenda to help determine future directions and advance cross-disciplinary collaboration.

 Results  Of the 143 people registered for the conference, 137 provided valid email addresses. There was a wide range of attendees, with the 3 most common groups being plastic surgeons (28 [19.6%]), general surgeons (19 [13.3%]), and researchers (25 [17.5%])....