title: Assessing Patient Reported Outcomes Measures via Phone Interviews Versus Patient Self-Survey in the Clinic: Are We Measuring the Same Thing?
abstract: BACKGROUND
  Longitudinally following patients requires a full-time employee (FTE)-dependent data inflow infrastructure. There are efforts to capture patient-reported outcomes (PROs) by the use of non-FTE-dependent methodologies. In this study, we set out to assess the reliability of PRO data captured via FTE-dependent compared with non-FTE-dependent methodologies.
  
  
  METHODS
  A total of 119 adult patients (65 men) who underwent 1-and 2-level lumbar fusions at Duke University Medical Center were enrolled in this prospective study. Enrollment criteria included available demographic, clinical, and PRO data. All patients completed 2 sets of questionnaires--the first a phone interviews and the second a self-survey. There was at least a 2-week period between the phone interviews and self-survey. Questionnaires included the Oswestry Disability Index (ODI), the visual analog scale for back pain (VAS-BP), and the visual analog scale for leg pain (VAS-LP). Repeated-measures analysis of variance was used to compare the reliability of baseline PRO data captured.
  
  
  RESULTS
  A total of 39.49% of patients were smokers, 21.00% had diabetes, and 11.76% had coronary artery disease; 26.89% reported history of anxiety disorder, and 28.57% reported history of depression. A total of 97.47% of patients had a high-school diploma or General Education Development, and 49.57% attained a 4-year college degree or postgraduate degree. We observed a high correlation between baseline PRO data captured between FTE-dependent versus non-FTE dependent methodologies (ODI: r = -0.89, VAS-BP: r = 0.74, VAS-LP: r = 0.70). There was no difference in PROs of baseline pain and functional disability between FTE-dependent and non-FTE-dependent methodologies: baseline ODI (FTE-dependent: 47.73 ± 16.77 [mean ± SD] vs. non-FTE-dependent: 45.81 ± 12.11, P = 0.39), VAS-LP (FTE-dependent: 6.13 ± 2.78 vs. non-FTE-dependent: 6.46 ± 2.79, P = 0.36) and VAS-BP (FTE-dependent: 6.33 ± 2.90 vs. non-FTE-dependent: 6.53 ± 2.48, P = 0.57).
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Our study suggests that there is great reliability between PRO data captured between FTE-dependent and non-FTE-dependent methodologies.
authors.affiliation: Division of Neurosurgery, Duke University Medical Center, Durham, North Carolina, USA. Electronic address: owoicho.adogwa@gmail.com.
authors.forename: Owoicho
authors.initials: O
authors.lastname: Adogwa
authors.affiliation: Division of Neurosurgery, Duke University Medical Center, Durham, North Carolina, USA.
authors.forename: Aladine A
authors.initials: AA
authors.lastname: Elsamadicy
authors.affiliation: Department of Neurosurgery, Vanderbilt University Medical Center, Nashville, Tennessee, USA.
authors.forename: Joseph
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Cheng
authors.affiliation: Department of Neurosurgery, University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center, Dallas, Texas, USA.
authors.forename: Carlos
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Bagley
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D004185:Disability Evaluation; D005260:Female; D006282:Health Personnel; D006801:Humans; D008161:Lumbosacral Region; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D010146:Pain / Q000209:etiology; D010147:Pain Measurement; D063868:Patient Outcome Assessment; D011446:Prospective Studies; D015203:Reproducibility of Results; D012307:Risk Factors; D012959:Socioeconomic Factors; D013123:Spinal Fusion; D011795:Surveys and Questionnaires; D013689:Telephone
keywords: Clinic surveys; FTE-dependent; Non-FTE dependent; Oswestry Disability Index; PROs; Patient-reported outcomes; Phone interviews; Visual analog score