PROGRESS Characteristics | Example | Effect on Outcome Identification and Prioritization |
---|---|---|
Place of residence | Treatment that requires frequent trips to the hospital, health center, or specialist. | The patient may prioritize outcomes in their condition (e.g., reduced symptom severity, improved function) differently if they are unable to comply with the treatment schedule (e.g., because of a long distance to the health center) or may not receive appropriate followup care (e.g., advice regarding changes to dosage or side effect management, may not have access to a specialist). |
Race/ethnicity/culture/language | There are cultural differences in how fatigue is experienced (e.g., Egyptian patients describe effects of fatigue as mostly physical while other populations, e.g., United Kingdom, Sweden, describe both physical and mental effects)32,33. | The outcome measure may not accurately identify the different conceptualizations and meanings of fatigue in all groups within the population. |
Occupation | A patient’s type of work (e.g., manual labor) can affect outcomes. | In cancer-related work studies, manual laborers reported greater difficulty returning to work after treatment; therefore, greater improvements in other outcomes (e.g., pain, function) may be required to accurately assess return to work34. |
Gender/Sex | A patient’s sex may affect their experience with pain35. | Depending on sex, a patient may prioritize pain relief over function or other outcome. |
Religion | Religious customs may place important physical demands on patients (e.g., kneeling to pray)20. | For some religious patients, these outcomes may become more important than others (e.g., ability to kneel to pray may be more important than overall pain). |
Education | Low education of patients makes it difficult to ensure an accurate response when administering a standard PROM36. | Patients may respond to questions inaccurately due to poor comprehension or misunderstanding which can affect the interpretation of their responses (e.g., quality of life, disease severity)37. |
Socioeconomic status | An effective but expensive intervention. | Some people who cannot afford an expensive intervention may, therefore, place more value on other outcomes addressed through less expensive interventions (e.g., disease severity assessed with magnetic resonance imaging vs quality of life and function)36, 38. |
Social capital | An intrusive intervention that requires recovery time (e.g., major surgery). | Whether a patient has support (e.g., from friends and family) both physically and emotionally during and following treatment may affect how they perceive outcomes. |
PROGRESS: Place of residence, Race/ethnicity/culture/language, Occupation, Gender/sex, Religion, Education, Socioeconomic status, and Social Capital; PROM: patient-reported outcome measures.