Using health outcomes data to inform decision-making: patient perspective.

Increasingly in the developed world, patients expect to be partners in the management of their healthcare. Several recent studies show that the patient perspective differs from the perspective of the healthcare provider. Patients usually focus on the impact of their condition on their lifestyle, while clinicians may tend to focus on simple objective measures. Like other people, patients with chronic disease such as allergy and asthma want to live as normal a life as possible, and the ability to do so is influenced by the level of disease control, by environmental factors and by social factors. Healthcare managers need to be aware of the patient perspective to ensure that it is taken into account in decision-making.