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OTE200 Survey: Patient-reported outcomes
Is the orthopaedic specialty ready to implement patient-reported outcomes measures as a new standard?
There is increasing scientific support that patient-reported outcomes are vital to really understanding the outcome of the patient. It has been shown that the use of observer-administered questionnaires might introduce a positive bias yielding a better outcome. For example, in evaluating the reconstruction of the ACL 1 year after surgery, surgeons rated the outcome with regard to knee function and activity level as significantly better than the patients. In order to avoid bias, the patient should assess patient-relevant outcomes, such as function and activity level. There are recent studies recommending patient-reported outcomes for evaluating e.g., patients with hip osteoarthritis undergoing both non-surgical treatment and surgical interventions such as total hip replacement as well as hip arthroscopy. All physicians may not fully be ready to implement this, but it is definitely time to start the process.
— Per Renström, MD, PhD
Professor
emeritus, Department of Molecular Medicine and Surgery
Centre for Sports
Trauma Research
Karolinska Institute, Stockholm, Sweden
Disclosure: He has no relevant financial disclosures.
A note from the editors: The OTE200 is a group of approximately 200 European orthopaedic practitioners, educators and researchers whose opinions we poll each month. If you would like to be considered for membership, please send a request to ote@slackinc.com.