NQF will convene a multistakeholder technical expert panel (TEP) to identify the attributes of high-quality patient-reported outcome measures (PROMs) and create step-by-step guidance for using these PROMs as the foundation for developing digital patient-reported outcome performance measures (PRO-PMs). To gather additional feedback, key informant interviews and focus groups will be conducted, in addition to public commenting periods for the environmental scan report, interim report, and technical guidance report. Read more

Description

Overview

Building a Roadmap From Patient-Reported Outcome Measures to Patient-Reported Outcome Performance Measures (henceforth referred to as Building a Roadmap) builds upon a long history of collaborative work between Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) and the National Quality Forum (NQF). This CMS-funded initiative aims to provide guidance to healthcare stakeholders, particularly measure developers, who are working to create and maintain digital patient-reported outcome performance measures (PRO-PMs) that can be used in CMS value-based purchasing (VBP) programs, alternative payment models (APMs), and other accountability programs. The work began in 2020 and will culminate in late 2022. It is guided by a Technical Expert Panel (TEP) comprised of multistakeholder leaders in measure development, health information technology, research, clinical care, patient advocacy, and other healthcare fields.

The Opportunity

CMS is committed to elevating the voices of patients through the use of patient-reported outcomes (PROs). While hundreds of patient-reported outcome measures (PROMs) exist to capture data on patients’ perspectives, only a few dozen NQF-endorsed PRO-PMs offer opportunities to use those data for performance measurement and accountability. CMS and NQF have heard from stakeholders about the lack of detailed technical guidance to help measure developers select high quality PROMs and create new digital PRO-PMs that can potentially be used in CMS’ VBP programs or APMs. The Building a Roadmap initiative aims to address this barrier by assessing the current state of digital PRO-PM development, identifying attributes of PROMs for use in high quality PRO-PMs, and creating a roadmap to guide the development of digital PRO-PMs.

About the Project

First Year

During the first year of the initiative, NQF convened a multistakeholder TEP to guide the completion of an Environmental Scan, an Interim Report, and a Technical Guidance Report. The Environmental Scan evaluates the current state of PRO-PM development, including available guidance on developing PRO-PMs. The Interim Report revisits and expands upon past work from 2012-2015, and highlights attributes of high quality PROMs that are suitable for use in digital PRO-PMs. The Technical Guidance Report comprises a series of stages and tasks that measure developers can follow to develop PRO-PMs that are suitable for CMS accountability programs.

Second Year

The work throughout the second year will also be guided by the TEP and will build on the foundational work established during the base period. NQF will conduct key informant interviews with measure developers to better understand the strengths and improvement opportunities of the deliverables developed during the first year. With that information, NQF will prepare a Developer Feedback Report. This report, along with feedback from the TEP and any novel literature on PRO-PMs and digital measurement, will inform updates to the Environmental Scan Report and the Technical Guidance Report. The updates during the second year will focus on, but will not be limited to, unique development factors related to digital PRO-PMs.

Objectives

During the second year, the TEP will provide input and guidance to:

  • Conduct key informant interviews with measure developers to obtain feedback on the strengths, limitations, and recommendations for updating the Technical Guidance Report
  • Revise the Environmental Scan Report developed in the base period based on new literature and key informant interviews
  • Prepare a Developer Feedback Report to discuss user experience of the Technical Guidance
  • Update the Technical Guidance based on the findings of the Developer Feedback Report

NQF Process

During the second year, NQF will reconvene the multistakeholder TEP with six (6) 90-minute web meetings over a 12-month period. The TEP will help to inform updates to the Key Informant Interviews, Environmental Scan, Developer Feedback Report, and the Technical Guidance Report.

Funding

This project is funded under a contract with the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services. For information about the availability of auxiliary aids and services for NQF’s federally funded projects, please visit http://www.medicare.gov/about-us/nondiscrimination/nondiscrimination-notice.html.

Related NQF Work

Contact Information

For more information, please contact the project team at propmroadmap@qualityforum.org. Thank you for your interest in this project.

NQF will convene a multistakeholder technical expert panel (TEP) to identify the attributes of high-quality patient-reported outcome measures (PROMs) and create step-by-step guidance for using these PROMs as the foundation for developing digital patient-reported outcome performance measures (PRO-PMs). To gather additional feedback, key informant interviews and focus groups will be conducted, in addition to public commenting periods for the environmental scan report, interim report, and technical guidance report. Read more
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