EBSCO Health, a division of EBSCO Information Services and the creator of DynaMed Plus®, has entered into a licensing arrangement with Dartmouth College and the founders of the Option Grid™ Collaborative to advance evidence-based shared decision making. With this new collaboration, EBSCO Health will combine methodologies utilised at The Dartmouth Institute for Health Policy and Clinical Practice (TDI) at the Geisel School of Medicine with EBSCO Health's expertise in evidence-based medicine to develop a multitude of new patient decision aids to be distributed under the Option Grid trademark.
Shared decision making is becoming an essential part of the patient-doctor relationship and an emerging focus in health care. The National Learning Consortium of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) says shared decision making is important in situations where 'there is no single 'right' health care decision.' The Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ) of HHS sees shared decision making as a way to provide consistent, evidence-based information to patients and 'increase knowledge, improve risk estimates, increase patient’s involvement in decisions, and help clarify treatment preferences.'
Patient decision aids are tools to help achieve shared decision making by enabling patients to understand and compare their healthcare options in the context of their personal preferences and values, and arrive at informed decisions. State and national efforts to require and encourage shared decision making are underway, including legislative changes in Washington State that afford enhanced legal protection to physicians who use evidence-based decision aids, requirements of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) regarding the use of evidence-based decision aids to be eligible for payment for certain procedures, and the availability of funding opportunities from CMS to test shared decision making models.
Option Grid decision aids are brief, easy-to-read decision aids that can be used in the clinical encounter, allowing patients and their doctors to compare healthcare options based on high-quality, evidence-based answers to patients' commonly asked questions. Research shows Option Grid decision aids increase patient knowledge and shared decision making without increasing the length of a clinical visit.
Since 2012, TDI has operated the Option Grid Collaborative — a network of researchers, practitioners and other individuals who have developed and disseminated Option Grid decision aids. The Option Grid Collaborative was founded by Dr. Glyn Elwyn and Dr. Marie-Anne Durand, CPsychol, professors at the Geisel School of Medicine at Dartmouth, who are key opinion leaders in the field of shared decision making, having published international research and served on national advisory committees in United States and the United Kingdom.
An April 4, 2017 article in the Journal of the American Medical Association titled 'Prime Time for Shared Decision Making' calls for 'the implementation of high-quality and achievable shared decision making,' including trustworthy decision aids that can be easily integrated into clinical practice with minimal burden. EBSCO Health believes that the new generation of EBSCO Health Option Grid decision aids will provide a considerable step forward to achieving that vision, allowing shared decision making to become a reality in the routine practice of healthcare.
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