Patient Reported Outcomes (PRO) Core

Director: Wendy Coster, PhD, OTR/L; Boston University

Importance of PRO as a Medical Rehabilitation Outcome

Patient’s self report (or a clinician’s judgment of patient’s functional status) of functional status or quality of life is an essential outcome in medical rehabilitation clinical trials. Since PROs capture the patient’s perspective, they are an especially convincing measure to assess performance or the process of rehabilitation.

Aim:

To enhance and integrate the scientific contributions of PRO instruments for use in clinical trial research in medical rehabilitation, including pilot and exploratory studies, and other peer-reviewed projects whose support is independent of this project.

Activities:

• Provide expert guidance in the design, conduct, and analysis of clinical trial research in medical rehabilitation using PROs
• Provide technical services and support.
• Create an exciting research core where innovative projects centered on the development, linking, validation and application of PROs for children and adults is fostered, debated and advanced.

Register for consultative services with the PRO CORE.

PRO Instruments developed at Boston University:

Instrument	Description	Appropriate Use
Activity Measure for Post-Acute Care™ (AM-PAC™) CAT	Measures function in three domains: basic mobility, daily activities and applied cognitive, and can be used for quality improvement, outcomes monitoring, and research activities in inpatient and outpatient rehabilitation, home care, nursing homes and long-term acute care settings	Functional assessment in adults with a wide range of diagnoses and functional abilities.
The Late-Life FDI™ (LLFDI)	The Late-Life FDI™ assesses and responds to meaningful change in two distinct outcomes: function–a person’s ability to do discrete actions or activities, and disability–a person’s performance of socially defined life tasks. There is a 16-item disability component and a 32-item function component.	Community-dwelling older adults.
Pediatric Evaluation of Disability Inventory™ (PEDI™) CAT	The PEDI™ is a descriptive measure of a child’s current functional performance and can track changes over time. The PEDI™ measures both capability and performance of functional activities in three content domains:  • Self-care • Mobility • Social function	A comprehensive clinical assessment of key functional capabilities and performance in children between the ages of six months and seven years. The PEDI™ can be used to evaluate older children with functional abilities that are less than those expected of a 7-year-old child without disabilities.

 

PRO Instruments under development at Boston University:

Instrument	Grant Source	Development Stage
Computer Adaptive Testing for OA Clinical Trials (physical function, pain, disability)	R01 NIH/NIAMS	Validation
Dyspena CAT for persons with COPDGrant Source: R21 NIH/NHLB	Shriners Hospital for Children Research Grants	Validation
Adult Spinal Cord Injury CAT (physical functioning)	NIDRR	Validation
Development of a Community Re-integration Instrument for Soldiers (CRIS-CAT)	VA	Validation