The collection of patient-reported experience Measures (PREMs) and patient-reported outcome Measures (PROMs) is an essential component of health services evaluations.As the maker of a care coordination and patient management platform, we have paid attention to an increasing number of healthcare providers are looking for new and efficient ways to collect PREMs and PROMs.
So are what patient-reported experience measures (PREMs)?
PREM questionnaires are measuring patients' perceptions of their experience while receiving care. Since PREMs are all about the experience, patients might feel the same event, in the same hospital in the same care pathway slightly differently and for that reason, there is a real need to collect a large amount of high quality and well-structured PREMs in order to be able to draw statistically valid and realistic conclusions.
Some forerunners are already talking about ePREMs (Electronic Patient-Reported Experience Measures), which are PREM questionnaires collected online.
PREMs can be collected through several channels such as online, through an app, F2F, SMS, paper format or a phone call. No matter how the PREMs are collected, the following table summarizes the most common PREMs themes.
Challenges in the collection of PREMs
Measuring only the overall patient experience
Many healthcare providers collect PREMs through one single questionnaire only at the very end of the care process covering the whole care pathway. This gives a very comprehensive experience evaluation of the overall care process, but the provider is lacking more specific data in regards to the specific steps that went well in the opinion of the patient as opposed to those that leave room for improvement.
Lengthy questionnaires - lower response rates and rushed answers
One lengthy PREM questionnaire at the very end of the care pathway might be problematic as some respondents are not willing to use 15-20 minutes of completion time, but using 5 minutes might be OK for them. Some of the respondents might abandon the lengthy questionnaires, which leads to lower response rates. The more questions a questionnaire or survey has, the more likely it is that some of the patients will rush through the questionnaire, and the quality and the reliability of the collected data suffers.
How to automate the PREMs collection?
Our customers provide a mobile app to their patients, which helps them to navigate through the care process. The app sends push-notifications and reminders to ensure that patients are well informed of the next steps in the care path.This provides an excellent opportunity for automating the collection of PREMs throughout each step in the care process. Patients become familiar with the app, which leads to higher response rates.
Short split questionnaires through an app
1) Specific data for each step.
Short split questionnaires provide specific data of each step regarding the care process, and it is easier for a patient to recall what happened today or yesterday than two weeks ago.
2) What went well and what needs improvement.
Specific data of each care process step helps the hospital management to identify where the critical patients’ concerns are, find waste in the process and notice the steps that went well.Recognizing providers and employees along the way for a job well done, is as important as rectifying mistakes and preventing potential issues. The service received from the healthcare provider influences very much to a patient’s care experience, and it’s important to put effort into developing the service level.
3) The number of responses.
Splitting the large PREM questionnaire into smaller units can increase not only the quality and the reliability of the responses, but also the number of responses.
4) Data Reporting.
Once a large number of PREMs have been collected, a good reporting tool helps in visualizing and analyzing the data for the decision-makers.
Here are some examples of short, high-quality patient experience questionnaires
One example of the short questionnaire is The Nordic Patient Experiences Questionnaire NORPEQ, which uses short 8-item questionnaires and includes what are judged to be the most important aspects of experiences for patients. Another example is The Generic Short Patient Experiences Questionnaire GS-PEQ.
Read more about Buddy Healthcare's automated electronic PROMs and PREMs collection.
Do you want to discuss how to collect PREMs or PROMs through a mobile app and get reports to your dashboard?
We can help you with the process automation, Simply contact us or book a short demo and we can discuss how the BuddyCare Platform could support your hospital or clinic.
Some PREMs respondents are not willing to use 15-20 minutes of completion time, but using 5 minutes might be OK.
