Is Patient-Centered Care Effective for Rheumatology?

Dr. Shoor measures success for each patient who has received patient-centered care by their satisfaction with their care, which is measured with CDAI and RAPID 3. He also evaluates whether patients have met their defined goal(s) for their care using a five-point scale that he has dubbed, “Have you met your goal?”

Although no studies exist that examine the satisfaction of rheumatologists or medical assistants regarding patient-centered care, Dr. Shoor’s practice developed a provider satisfaction survey, which they presented at the 2017 ACR/ARHP Annual Meeting. In their pilot study, they found that both rheumatologists and medical assistants had greater satisfaction scores after the study. “This [finding] is possibly a result of the increased support given to the rheumatologist by the medical assistant and increased patient contact,” he says.³

Another benefit of patient-centered care may be increased appointment accessibility for other rheumatology patients, because some RA patients may require fewer appointments. “Because the optimal frequency of routine follow-up visits for RA patients is unknown, scheduling had been based on habit or tradition,” Dr. Shoor says. Additionally, “without patient-centered care, disease activity was not monitored nor were patient needs accessed before the next regularly scheduled routine visit.

“We believe that continuous disease monitoring and proactive solicitation of patient needs in the interim between clinic visits will allow the disease activity of each patient’s RA to determine the optimal follow-up visit interval,” Dr. Shoor says. “We suspect that scheduled telephone and/or electronic check-ins will prolong the interval between routine clinic visits and, by doing so, will increase the availability of clinic appointments—another benefit.”

Karen Appold is a medical writer in Pennsylvania.

References

1. Lorig K, Holman H. Arthritis self-management studies: A 12-year review. Health Educ Q. 1993 Spring;20(1):17–28.
2. Warsi A, Wang PS, LaValley MP, et al. Self-management education programs in chronic disease: A systematic review and methodological critique of the literature. Arch Intern Med. 2004 Aug 9–23;164(15):1641–1649.
3. Sheth K, Valenzuela A, Shoor S, et al. Development and validation of a rheumatologist satisfaction with practice scale—“The Rheumatologist Satisfaction Scale” (RSS) [abstract]. Arthritis Rheumatol. 2017 Oct;69(suppl 10).