Health organisations worldwide are recognising the value of incorporating Patient-Reported Outcomes (PROs), or Patient-Reported Outcome Measures (PROMs), into their clinical healthcare practices.
In particular, orthopaedic clinics are prime candidates for PRO-enhanced care as much of the success of orthopaedic procedures relies on the patient’s commitment to follow their recovery programme. However, many clinicians object to the use of PROMs due to the limitations associated with traditional, paper-based PROMs, such as data quality, administration burden, and value of PRO data in a clinical setting.
But now, with electronically run PRO programmes or ePROs several of these traditional barriers are removed.
Electronically run PRO programmes, or ePROs, use a combination of modes (email and SMS) to conveniently solicit feedback from the patient in the comfort of his/her home. It is also possible to add patient comment fields, where patients can be frank about their perceived treatment and health status. The use of ePROs increases adherence to medication regimens and recovery programmes, which can improve health outcomes and eliminate unplanned or unnecessary clinic visits.
By using several modes to reach patients, focusing on digital mechanisms (email, SMS, and tablets in the clinic), one can achieve up to 97% participation in the baseline ePRO (the remaining 3% may decline for privacy reasons) as long as the process is integrated in the clinical process. Importantly, ePROs are much more cost-effective than traditional PROs, so these high participation rates do not result in excessive administrative costs.
Cemplicity’s highly automated system collects as many ePRO from patients by email and SMS as possible, then generates a list of patients who have yet to complete the ePRO on their day of treatment. Staff in the clinic can simply pass the patient the tablet on arrival, and the patient can complete the ePRO prior to their consultation.
Conclusively, ePROs optimise patient reach and response rates while minimising cost and staff administration.
Additionally, many of the objections we hear from orthopaedic surgeons arise when they are expected to use generic quality of life surveys or other unvalidated PRO not suited to their specialism. But, in a clinician-led PRO programme, you can select the condition-specific PRO most suited to your service and goals, optimising the feedback’s full-value. Such condition-specific PRO data is highly useful for tracking recovery pathways and Improving future care strategies.
Most importantly, a well-designed, clinically-led ePRO programme opens up communication between patient and clinician by enabling surgeons to access patient responses in time to use in consultation. Such measures improve shared decision-making and patient engagement, leading to better patient satisfaction and health outcomes.
So, whether you are a clinician looking to grow your practice by referral or an organisation looking to improve health outcomes and service quality, Cemplicity is here to provide you with the ePRO programme most suitable to your service’s needs.