HOW PRO'S CAN CONTRIBUTE TO WHAT MATTERS MOST TO PATIENTS WITH OROFACIAL CLEFTS

DENTAL PATIENT-REPORTED OUTCOMES UPDATE 2023

The emergence and rapid development of disruptive innovations are quickly turning our profession into personalized dentistry, built upon evidence-based, data-oriented, and patient-centered research. In order to help improve the quality and quantity of patient-centered evidence in dentistry, further promote the wide and standard use of dental patient-reported outcomes (dPROs) and dental patient-reported outcome measures (dPROMs), the Journal of Evidence-Based Dental Practice has put together this special issue, the third of a series entitled Dental Patient-Reported Outcomes Update. A total of 7 solicited articles are collected in this issue. To put them into a broader perspective, this review provides a concise summary of key, selected PRO and dPRO articles published during 2023. A brief introduction to those articles included in this Special Issue follows. Four main domains are covered in this Special Issue: (1) dPROs and digital dentistry, (2) standardization of dPRO-related methodology, (3) current usage of dPROs and dPROMs in published research, and (iv) the significance and relevance of dPRO usage.

MEASURING PATIENT EXPERIENCE OF ORAL HEALTH CARE: A CALL TO ACTION

BACKGROUND

Surveys to measure patients' experiences of health care are common practice in general medical care to improve patient centered care. However, such questionnaires are not consistently used to capture the patient's experience of oral health care. Because patient experience is an important component of oral health care, there is an urgent need to measure it in the oral health care setting.

PURPOSE

The purpose of this article is to illustrate the need for patient experience measurement in oral health care, highlight the challenges such measurement in this setting faces, and provide a set of next steps to advance care experience measurement for dental patients.

BASIC PROCEDURES

We conducted a comprehensive review of the literature examining patient experience measurement in medical and oral health care. This focused on studies aimed at understanding the current measurement landscape and existing measurement tools. We also gathered additional information and perspectives through discussions with key informants and stakeholders.

MAIN FINDINGS

There is a critical need for patient experience measurement in oral health care. To develop a program to measure patient experiences of oral care, the following should be done: (1) convene stakeholders and get their buy-in; (2) develop a patient experiences of oral health conceptual framework; (3) develop a survey tool that captures key aspects of patient experiences of oral health; (4) pilot the survey tool; (5) assess the survey tool...s psychometric properties; and (6) refine and finalize the survey tool.

PRINCIPLE CONCLUSIONS

To advance the measurement of the quality of oral health care, we outline a stepwise methodology that captures dental patient experiences of oral health care.

DENTAL PATIENT-REPORTED OUTCOMES UPDATE 2022

Much progress has been made this year in patient-reported outcomes related research. A number of important articles were published, shedding light on relevant methodological issues as well as future directions. In order to further promote the wide use of dental patient-reported outcomes (dPROs) and dental patient-reported outcome measures (dPROMs) in dental research and dental practice, and to provide novel insights into relevant measurement and analytical methods, the Journal of Evidence-Based Dental Practice has put together this special issue, the second of a series entitled Dental Patient-Reported Outcomes Update. To put Special Issue articles into a broader perspective, this review will provide a concise summary of key, relevant PRO and dPRO articles published during the year of 2022. A brief introduction of those manuscripts collected in this Special Issue follows. Six main domains are covered in this Special Issue: (i) the availability and applicability of dPROs and dPROMs, (ii) the current usage of dPROs and dPROMs in published research, (iii) methodological considerations in dPRO-related research, (iv) the landscape and trends of dPRO-related research, (v) the significance and relevance of dPRO usage, and (vi) dPROs and value-based oral health care.