OECD: fifteen recommendations to boost the use of patient outcomes

A high level group set up by the OECD has made fifteen recommendations to promote the use of Patient-Reported Outcome Measures (PROMs) and Patient-Reported Experience Measures (PREMs). The proposals aim to make it easier to make comparisons of the performance of different national health systems.

Health ministers welcomed the proposals and stressed the importance of patient-reported indicators for developing better health care systems. “Measuring how care affects those outcomes that matter most to people and linking those with information already collected by the OECD, such as on expenditure, resources, safety and effectiveness of health care, will help us gain new knowledge on how to improve lives for all,” they said in a joint statement.

From the report: 

The first six OECD recommendations for comparison of health system performance through patient-reported indicators:

1. OECD work to extend and deepen the benchmarking of health system performance should focus on collecting patient-reported indicators at a disease level, sector level, health-service level, and whole-system level. In each case, the focus should be on enabling international comparison.

2. The prioritisation of patient-reported indicators for development should be guided by the following criteria:

• Work should initially focus on clinical areas where the OECD already collects other data, such as prevalence of risk factors, indicators of need, activity volumes or survival estimates. Such complementary data should be used to place patient-reported performance in the broader health system context.
• Work should begin with validated indicators that countries are already using and, where possible, seek to accelerate international adoption and/or harmonisation across countries.
• Prioritisation should also take patients’ priorities into account, identified through surveys, focus groups or other means.

3. Where valid patient-reported indicators do not yet exist for priority diseases, sectors or services, new indicators and patient surveys should be developed.

4. All indicators should be formally assessed and piloted in different languages and settings, to ensure feasibility, utility and validity for the purposes of international comparison.

5. The OECD should use its established structures, principally the Health Care Quality Indicators Expert Group and the Health Committee, to guide the prioritisation of patient-reported indicators for development, and the technical assessment of feasibility, utility and validity for the purposes of international comparison.

6. The OECD should explore collaboration with other international organisations, such as the World Health Organisation, the European Commission, the Commonwealth Fund and the International Consortium for Health Outcomes Measurement (ICHOM), work to extend and deepen the benchmarking of patient-reported performance indicators.

More recommendations can be read in the report.