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OVERVIEW

The mission of the Patient-Reported Outcome, Value and Experience (PROVE) Center is to expand the collection, analysis and use of patient-reported outcomes data in surgery. The PROVE Center focuses on using innovative techniques to study outcomes that matter most to patients and their caregivers. Through collaboration with clinicians, researchers, patient advocates and policymakers, we seek to amplify the patient voice in surgical decision-making and care.

We employ cutting-edge methods to build condition-specific patient-reported outcome measures (PROMs) and to implement these and other measures into research, quality improvement and assessment of healthcare value. The PROVE Center also develops patient and clinician-facing digital platforms that facilitate meaningful use of patient-reported outcomes (PROs) in clinical care. PROVE researchers specialize in mixed methods research, qualitative and quantitative methods, evidence synthesis, psychometrics (including computer adaptive testing), and health economic evaluations. With these skills, our multidisciplinary team aims to promote and operationalize high-value, patient-centered care at Brigham Health, Mass General Brigham and around the world.

Research

  • PROs in Clinical Care
    • imPROVE Breast Cancer Care – development and implementation of a new patient portal to facilitate collection and meaningful use of PROMs
    • Developed a digital patient intake system to streamline preoperative assessment of quality of life (BWH Bariatric Surgery)
  • PROs Improving Quality
    • Enhanced electronic capture of PROs using the National Surgical Quality Improvement Program (NSQIP)
    • Linkage of PROMs data to clinical variables (BWH Urology)
  • PROs Advancing Value-based Healthcare
    • THRIVE – collaboration with the American College of Surgeons and the Harvard Business School to expand national PRO measurement in surgical care to determine value
    • Development of preference-based measures for use in cost-effectiveness evaluations of healthcare interventions (e.g., BREAST-Q Utility module)
  • PROs in Outcomes Research
    • Development and validation of PROMs for surgical patients (e.g., BREAST-Q for breast surgery, BODY-Q for bariatric and body contouring surgery, FACE-Q for facial surgery, WOUND-Q for wounds, GENDER-Q for gender affirming treatments, MIGRAINE-Q for migraine headaches, LYMPH-Q for lymphedema)
    • Conduct of patient-centered comparative effectiveness and cost-effectiveness studies of surgical interventions

More information on our projects, publications, and trainees can be found at www.qportfolio.org and at http://prove.bwh.harvard.edu/

Research Students

Showly Nicholson
Anamika Veeramani

Research Staff

Joanna O’Gorman

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