Resumen
Patient-reported outcomes (PROs) are information collected directly from patients regarding their health status. Emerging evidence has suggested that integrating PRO assessments into oncology clinical practice can have various benefits for patient care and health. This systematic review and meta-analysis investigated the effects of routine PRO monitoring on the overall survival of people with any type of cancer. We included six studies that compared these interventions to the care that is usually provided to cancer patients. The results seemed to indicate that monitoring PROs in cancer care could positively influence overall survival and that benefits could be largest for individuals with advanced lung cancer. Possible explanations for these findings are that PRO surveillance may allow clinicians to respond to problems more rapidly or that better symptom management could improve tolerance to therapy, thus extending its benefits. However, since available studies are few and of suboptimal quality, additional rigorous research is needed to consolidate our results.