The following information and request for comment relates to an AUGS initiative related to quality assessment for prolapse treatment.
Background
For high volume, low surgical risk procedures, patient-reported outcomes (PRO) are an important way to measure the quality of the care that is delivered. When designing such a tool, it is important to include multiple concepts that are important to patients. For example, in a comprehensive prolapse care assessment tool, we need to ask about symptoms of prolapse (e.g., bulge), but also about other symptoms and limitations on functioning important to patients such as urinary function, sexual function, social and physical limitations. Our field presently lacks one concise and comprehensive tool that can be feasibly implemented in high-volume clinics.
A questionnaire was developed with rigorous methodology that began with review of all existing items on currently available PRO questionnaires. In an iterative process, candidate items were tested via cognitive interviews with patients and revised and retained depending on their performance. AUGS experts worked closely with our patient representative committee in two consensus conferences to guide and participate in this process.
Request
We invite feedback from the clinical and scientific community on the new proposed questionnaire. In addition, we anticipate that only a subset of these questions will be used as performance indicators (i.e., questions that are used to assess quality of prolapse care). Though research will inform these decisions, we also invite comments on the utility of individual items as part of routine quality assessment.
To download the paper, agree to the disclaimer below.