Decision Support
A primary mission of the Foundation is to promote understanding and adoption of informed medical decision-making. We believe only in this way will the quality of medical decisions improve in the U.S.
Informed medical decision-making involves a conversation between a patient and his or her health care provider in which the clinician communicates scientific and medical information and the patient communicates his or her values and preferences regarding care. Although the heart of shared decision-making is this conversation, its success is best supported through decision support tools, such as decision aids.
Patient Decision Aids
Decision aids are paper-based or electronic tools that help support and streamline the medical decision-making process. Their use has been shown to improve decision quality.
Because patients engaging in shared decision-making rely on the information presented in decision aids, it is vitally important that the information be valid. Quality standards ensure that the information in patient decision aids is evidence-based, balanced, and free of bias or conflict.
Combining Information for Patients
To gather unbiased scientific information on a given clinical condition, the Foundation conducts systematic reviews of the most recent evidence from medical studies. To gather patient perspectives and preferences about these clinical conditions, we conduct focus groups. Using data from these two distinct types of research, we create professional state-of-the-art Shared Decision-Making® programs (such as DVDs, videos, booklets, etc.) that include unbiased, up-to-date scientific information along with the voice of real patients explaining their decisions based on individual preferences and values.