A Short Patient-Reported Outcome Measure for Oral Anticancer Agents: Multicenter Observational Study

Area of Science:

• Oncology
• Patient-Reported Outcomes
• Pharmacology

Background:

• The Michigan Oncology Quality Consortium developed RapidPRO, a patient-reported outcome measure for oral anticancer agents (OAAs).
• The goal was to create a single instrument for all OAAs to simplify implementation in clinical practice.
• This contrasts with common cancer-specific approaches.

Purpose of the Study:

• To describe the clinical use of RapidPRO in oncology practices.
• To quantify symptom burden, patient confidence in symptom management, and OAA medication adherence.
• To assess RapidPRO's utility in capturing patient experiences with OAAs.

Main Methods:

• An observational study was conducted across 6 oncology practices from July 2016 to December 2018.
• RapidPRO was used to assess patient symptoms, confidence, and OAA medication adherence.
• Data from 2252 completed RapidPROs by 695 patients were analyzed.

Main Results:

• Over half (53.9%) of completed RapidPROs reported at least one moderate to severe symptom.
• Medication nonadherence was reported in 28% of patients.
• The most common reason for nonadherence was experiencing side effects; 46.5% of patients reported a most bothersome symptom.

Conclusions:

• The RapidPRO measure effectively captures symptom burden and medication nonadherence in patients on OAAs.
• Implementation of RapidPRO allows practices to identify patients experiencing significant symptoms or nonadherence.
• This facilitates timely interventions to improve patient care and treatment outcomes.