Welcome to the Shared Decision Making (SDM) program newsletter. In this quarterly newsletter you will find updates in shared decision making research as well as recent publications.
Karen Sepucha, PhD receives two PCORI awards
Karen Sepucha, PhD, Director of the Health Decision Sciences Center, has recently been awarded funding from the Patient-Centered Outcomes Research Institute (PCORI) for two projects.
Dr. Sepucha and Dr. Sammy Elmariah from UCSF (co-PIs) will work with eight sites across the country to identify effective strategies to implement shared decision making and patient decision aids into routine care for decisions about aortic valve replacement.
Dr. Sepucha and Dr. Christopher Hartnick from Mass Eye and Ear/Mass General for Children (co-PIs) will conduct a pragmatic randomized controlled trial with six sites to evaluate a set of interventions designed to support caregivers and improve communication between hospital and pediatricians. The goal is to reduce parent/caregiver stress and improve health and safety for children with tracheostomies after they have been discharged to home.
This cluster randomized trial found that a short online SDM skills course led to higher patient reported SDM scores. Primary care physicians across MassGeneral Brigham and Maine Medical Center participated in this study.
Dr. Barry and colleagues conducted an environmental scan of newly developed decision aids during the pandemic. Shared decision making is evolving to interactions outside of the traditional face-to-face encounter and decision support is needing to rapidly evolve to keep up with the new health decisions and clinical models created by the pandemic.
Dr. Simmons and colleagues are leading a new Journal of General Internal Medicine (JGIM) series on shared decision-making. In the first article, they review the case of a 53-year-old man who recently recovered from a serious case of COVID and was reluctant to return to the hospital to get a colonoscopy. A SDM conversation led to a choice of stool-based test. Respecting the patient’s concerns and offering options was key to his acceptance of testing. The testing did find a rectal cancer that was able to be treated successfully.
Dr. Barry and colleagues assessed how a patient decision aid can help patients with abdominal aortic aneurysm (AAA) receive their preferred approach to AAA repair when faced with options through shared decision making.
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