Download PDF
Semin Plast Surg 1999; 13(4): 27-36
DOI: 10.1055/s-2008-1080230
Feature

© 1999 by Thieme Medical Publishers, Inc.

Outcomes Research in Plastic Surgery: Review and Practical Issues

Charles C. Miller III , Jeffrey D. Friedman
  • C.C.M., III, Associate Professor and Director, Division of Clinical Research and Outcomes, Department of Cardiothoracic and Vascular Surgery, University of Texas-Houston Medical School, Houston, TX
  • J.D.F., Assistant Professor, Division of Plastic Surgery, Department of Surgery, Baylor College of Medicine, Houston, TX
Further Information

Publication History

Publication Date:
19 June 2008 (online)

    Permissions and Reprints

ABSTRACT

The term outcomes research has been widely used in recent years to describe a branch of health care research that focuses on medical effectiveness. Effectiveness is distinguished from efficacy in that, where efficacy is the ability of a treatment to produce a physiological response in a controlled setting, effectiveness is a measure of the treatment's behavior under the actual prevailing conditions of clinical care. Outcomes research takes many forms, and has historically relied heavily on the use of administrative databases. Administrative data are not particularly helpful for following plastic surgery outcomes, which tend to be characterized more in the subtle in terms of quality of life than in the blunt indicators of length of stay and discharge status. We provide a discussion of the major forms of outcomes research and give some practical information on what kinds of outcome data and what research designs are most pertinent to plastic surgery.

Keywords

Outcomes research - quality of life - clinical research

      >