HOW DOES OUTCOME PREDICTION IN KNEE REPLACEMENTS AFFECT PATIENT DECISION MAKING

BackgroundThere is a 20% dissatisfaction rate with knee replacements. Calls for tools that can pre-operatively identify patients at risk of being dissatisfied postoperatively have been widespread. However, it is unclear what sort of information patients would want from such a tool, how it would affect their decision making process, and at what part of the pathway such a tool should be used.MethodsUsing focus groups involving 12 participants and in-depth interviews with 10 participants, we examined the effect outcome prediction has by providing fictitious predictions to patients at different stages of treatment. A qualitative analysis of themes, based on a constant comparative method, is used to analyse the data. This study was approved by the Dyfed Powys Research Ethics Committee (13/WA/0140).ResultsOur results demonstrate several interesting findings. Firstly, patients who have received information from friends and family are unwilling to adjust their expectation of outcome down (i.e. to a worse outcome)...