Abstract
Patient Reported Experience Measures (PREMs) are instruments that capture patients’ perspectives of health care services and offer insight into the perceived quality of care and identify areas for improvement. This rapid review aimed to identify and evaluate existing PREMs that explore patients’ experiences of psychosocial cancer care, describe their conceptual content and assess the quality of their development.
Databases (MEDLINE and PsycINFO) were searched from January 1995 to January 2023. Eligible papers included PREMs developed or tested in adult cancer populations. The psychosocial content of concepts assessed by PREMs were mapped and the quality of their development assessed using the Quality Assessment Checklist (QAC).
Twenty-three articles describing the development of 20 PREMs were identified. The content of these PREMs varied in terms of psychosocial domain coverage and the rigour of the development process. Quality assessment indicated that whilst instruments were well-developed, psychometric testing at this stage was less thoroughly reported on.
Several patient-reported instruments are available to measure patients’ psychosocial cancer care experiences; however, these differ in content and thoroughness. The choice of instrument used by researchers will therefore depend on research or clinical objectives and on striking a balance between comprehension and length. Limitations of this review are discussed.
•Many patients need psychosocial support during their cancer care.•It is important to measure patient’s views of their psychosocial care experiences.•Our review identified 20 cancer patient reported experience measures (PREMS).•PREMs varied in their scope, content, and methodological quality.•Future research should evaluate PREMs capacity to improve care experiences.