Chicago, IL, USA - The patient’s perspective is fast becoming an important component for health care decisions. For example, the Food and Drug Administration now has guidance for the development of patient-reported outcome instruments.
Patients with advanced kidney cancer are most concerned about fatigue, treatment side effects, and worry about one’s condition getting worse. Kidney cancer physicians more readily focus on symptoms that suggest disease progression or factors that can reduce or delay treatment such as bone pain, fever, and weight loss.
The NFKSI-19 symptom index demonstrated preliminary reliability and validity supporting its use in assessing health-related quality of life in clinical trials and routine clinical practice. Health-related quality of life is critical, particularly when curative treatment options are limited.
Both the clinician and patient perspectives have been included in the article “
Development and Initial Validation of the NCCN/FACT Symptom Index for Advanced Kidney Cancer,” published in
Value in Health.
Nan Rothrock, PhD, author of the study states, “By utilizing both patient and clinician perspectives, we have a measure that addresses patients’ concerns about quality of life as well as symptoms that are critical for treatment planning.”
Value in Health (ISSN 1098-3015) publishes papers, concepts, and ideas that advance the field of pharmacoeconomics and outcomes research as well as policy papers to help health care leaders make evidence-based decisions. The journal is published bi-monthly and has over 8,000 subscribers (clinicians, decision makers, and researchers worldwide).
International Society for Pharmacoeconomics and Outcomes Research (ISPOR) is a nonprofit, international, educational and scientific organization that strives to increase the efficiency, effectiveness, and fairness of health care resource use to improve health.
For more information: www.ispor.org