The Ask Patients Now website is organized to parallel your collection and use of PROs.

First, you will find step-by-step instructions for capturing PROs in clinic and from patients in their homes between visits. This section includes strategies for engaging your information technology and electronic health record team, your office staff, and patients in capturing PROs. The PRO data can then be used in clinical care and for quality monitoring and reporting.

Next, we review special considerations for using PROs in clinical care including PROs in shared decision-making tools and Annual Wellness Visits for CMS and other payers. For example, we describe the methods used to successfully collect pre-visit PROs and clinical- risk assessments from 15,000 patients before their first visit to an orthopedic surgeon. Next, our team integrated these patient-reported data in the Arthritis through Shared Knowledge (A.S.K.) report to inform treatment decisions. PRO lessons from this research are directly applicable to clinical care.

Last, we include emerging evidence on use of PROs by patients to monitor their symptoms between visits. Just as a patient with diabetes can monitor their blood glucose between visits, it is possible for patients with depression or osteoarthritis to monitor their emotional health or physical function using PROs and seek care when the symptoms change.

In addition, we provide a resource library to support you in implementing and using PROs. For example, we include handouts and guides to support your team’s successful PRO implementation. We also provide key published references that you may find helpful to inform PRO use in clinic and quality reporting.