11.1 To Use or Not to Use

Yes, that’s a question. As in, what use do patient surveys and questionnaires have in actual clinical practice? Sure, their use in research makes sense, and maybe even in academic practice, but if you’re in a busy private practice, you may dismiss these out of hand has having little to no utility and skip this chapter. This chapter explains how these instruments can be used effectively. Does author use these instruments while treating patients? Yes. Does the author get useful information from them? Most of the time. Do they cause problems? Yes, because patients complain about having to fill them out.

While discussing these types of surveys and questionnaires, only those instruments validated by the literature have been mentioned in this chapter. The author is not referring to a patient questionnaire that is available in every practice asking for various bits of information that help the practitioner with history taking. These validated instruments do have their place in actual clinical practice and can be useful in measuring and documenting patient outcomes.

11.2 The Basics

What is a patient-reported outcome measures (PROMs)? A patient-reported outcome is a health outcome that a patient directly reports, and the measure is the method that is used to capture that information. These measures include questionnaires, such as quality-of-life (QoL) questionnaires and surveys.

What is a QoL questionnaire? This is a clinically validated questionnaire that measures the relationship between the patient’s QoL (or certain aspects of QoL) and other behaviors, symptoms, or disease processes.

What’s a survey? And what’s the difference between a survey and a questionnaire? The technical definition of a survey is a process for gathering data that may involve different types of data collection methods, including a questionnaire. It’s a much broader term than questionnaire. A questionnaire is an instrument asking a given a set of oral or written questions. With the instruments given in ▶Table 11.1, in the author′s opinion, there is not much difference between a “survey” and a “questionnaire.” These two terms are used interchangeably in this chapter.

Which one should the practitioner use? Each instrument measures different things and has its own strengths and weaknesses. Some popular instruments are listed in ▶Table 11.1 to help the practitioner decide what to use. Some ideas are also given on how to effectively use them and avoid patient complaints.