Introducing the ePRO
Patient-Reported Outcomes (PROs) encompass the valuable insights patients provide during a clinical trial regarding their health, symptoms, treatment effects, and overall quality of life. Traditionally, PRO data was gathered through paper-based questionnaires or in-person interviews at the clinic. Yet, these approaches were not without challenges, being time-consuming and susceptible to memory bias or reporting inaccuracies.
The PRO’s digital sibling, the electronic Patient-Reported Outcomes (ePRO), changes the game by using electronic devices like smartphones, tablets, or web platforms to collect this PRO data. Patients now complete assessments or questionnaires on their phones, tablets and computers, providing investigators with real-time data.
Benefits of an ePRO tool
- Engaged and Empowered Patients: ePRO empowers patients to actively participate in clinical trials and provide information on their health status and treatment experience. This engagement creates a sense of partnership between patients and investigators, leading to improved patient retention rates and higher quality data.
- Real-Time Data Collection: Traditional paper-based data collection faces recall bias, while ePRO enables real-time symptoms, medication habits or quality of life or any habit changes tracking for prompt interventions. This digital approach improves disease management by capturing immediate patient insights and facilitating timely adjustments.
- Increased Protocol Compliance: By capturing data in real-time and actively encouraging patients’ reported activity throughout the study, the ePRO motivates participants to comply with the requested activities and treatment according to the protocol leading to reliable data and improved clinical trial outcomes.
- Improved Data Quality: ePRO minimizes recall bias and optimizes data accuracy by capturing patient reported information at the exact moment it is being experienced. Patients can document their symptoms, adherence to treatment, compliance, and overall wellbeing in real-time, reducing the risk of forgetting relevant data.
- Cost and Time Savings: An ePRO reduces administrative burden and resources needed to enter and process data manually. Not only an ePRO collects data more efficiently, but also leads to cost savings and in some instances, eliminating the need for frequent site visits, reducing travel-related costs for patients.
