Role for PROMs data to support quality improvement across the healthcare system: an informed exchange with senior health system leaders.

The Institute for Healthcare Improvement's Triple Aim (initiated in 2007) and several high-level Canadian studies have made general calls to improve health system performance. Managers and administrators have been urged to tackle the challenges of quality improvement and cost control. In the lead essay, McGrail et al. point to patient-reported outcome measures (PROMs) as something worth doing, and this has been welcomed as an appropriate response to long-standing calls for action. A recent gathering of senior health system leaders explored the prospect of routinely collecting PROMs data to drive quality improvement. The symposium, Measures of Health Outcomes to Improve Performance, Value and Productivity, was held in Victoria, British Columbia, on December 9, 2010. The symposium delegates considered the challenges and issues involved in moving forward with PROMs, looking closely at the potential for enhancing the quality of data resources available for managing our healthcare system. Senior leaders and administrators from the publicly funded healthcare systems of British Columbia and western and northern Canada participated in a frank discussion of challenges and requirements for moving forward with a PROMs initiative.