Massachusetts General Hospital instituted a program in 2005 to provide decision aids - materials such as pamphlets, videos and other online resources - to patients in an effort to help them learn more about their health care options and share in decisions about their care. What started as a single pilot in one primary care practice became a full-fledged program used by all of the hospital's adult primary care practices and extended to select specialty practices.
The results of this 10-year program were published in the April issue of Health Affairs. Co-authors Leigh Simmons, M.D., and Karen Sepucha, Ph.D., of Massachusetts General Hospital Health Decision Sciences Center, found that a wider awareness of shared decision making among clinicians led to more than doubling the use of decision aids. After several months of use, clinicians reported that the use of decision aids improved the quality of patient care and changed their discussions with patients. You can read more in the hospital's news release here.
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