Routine Assessment of Health Related Quality of Life in Head & Neck Cancer Patients: A 10 Years’ Experience

Abstract

Clinical outcomes are used on a daily basis in the practice of head and neck oncology. Clinical outcome assessments can be classified into categories, according to who makes the report: clinician-reported outcome assessment (health professional), observer-reported outcome assessment (caregiver), and patient-reported outcome assessment (patient or proxies).

We listed the following critical factors for successful implementation based on a decade of experience: institutional approval and support, inclusion of all first-line caregivers, uniformity of team objectives and institutional proposals, team formation and training, promotion of defined workflow in daily clinical practice, and ongoing monitoring and analysis.

The experience obtained with routine assessment of Health-Related Quality of Life allowed a much broader and inclusive understanding of its importance in the course of the disease.

Patients with head and neck cancer see questionnaires as an important part of their treatment plan because they know that these patient-centered outcomes will be used to improve healthcare quality – which is also our major goal.