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The following reports are currently under development. If you would like to provide comments about a particular topic, serve as a peer reviewer for the draft report, or know the timeline for completion, please contact the ESP Coordinating Center.
To review the most up-to-date protocols, please visit the PROSPERO website. Protocol registration numbers for an individual project can be found along with the brief abstract for the project, below.
KQ1a: What is the effect of teach-back on patient and provider outcomes?
KQ1b: Does the effect of teach-back vary based on clinical context (eg, hospital discharge, perioperative visit), intervention characteristic (eg, mode, content, interventionist), or patient characteristics (eg, education level, age)?
KQ2: What is the effect of strategies to increase use of teach-back on key implementation outcomes (eg, adoption, penetration, sustainability)?
Participants/population:
KQ1: Adult patients or their caregivers*; clinicians** delivering care to adult patients
KQ2: Health care organizations, clinics, teams, or clinicians; patients with or without their caregivers
*Caregiver includes any non-paid, informal individual providing supportive care
**Clinician is defined as health care provider (ie, MD, APP), pharmacist, psychologist, nurse, licensed clinical social worker, or other professionally trained clinical personnel
Intervention(s)/exposure(s):
KQ1: Single clinical synchronous, bi-directional encounter-based interaction using teach-back* by a clinician; must include demonstration of understanding of medical information or skills by repeating the information back to the clinician with or without demonstration of specific skill or behavior.
KQ2: Implementation strategies employed to improve the uptake or use of teach-back by a clinician.
*Include if labeled as “teach-back” but does not include specific intervention description as outlined above. “Teach-back” must be described as part of the intervention as opposed to a strategy used to evaluate an intervention. “Teach-back” must occur in the context of a real-time human interaction though initial education delivery may be delivered via recorded information.
Comparator(s):
KQ1: Usual care, other types of health education delivered by a clinician to a patient or their caregiver
KQ2: No implementation support, comparison between implementation strategies
Context:
Inpatient ward, outpatient clinics
Any country
Outcome(s):
KQ1: Proximal/intermediate outcomes:
KQ2: Implementation outcomes such as adoption, reach/penetration, adherence to teach-back/fidelity, sustained use, acceptability, feasibility
PROSPERO registration number: CRD42024603377
KQ1: What are the characteristics of studies that have evaluated antimicrobial stewardship programs or strategies focused on improving antimicrobial prescribing?
KQ2: For prioritized studies (based on settings and/or type of programs or strategies), what are the reported outcomes associated with implementation of antimicrobial stewardship programs or strategies?
PROSPERO registration number: CRD42024611898
KQ1a: What is the comparative effectiveness of high-intensity focused ultrasound therapy versus other surgical treatments (eg, deep brain stimulation, stereotactic radiosurgery and other ablative treatments) applied to specific anatomic targets for the treatment of:
KQ21b: Do benefits and harms vary by patient characteristics (including treatment history) and anatomic targets?
KQ2a: What are the benefits and harms of high-intensity focused ultrasound therapy applied to specific anatomic targets for the treatment of:
KQ2b: Do benefits and harms vary by patient characteristics (including treatment history) and anatomic targets?
KQ1: What measures and models have been evaluated to assess medical specialty physician productivity in ambulatory settings (including time and effort spent in indirect clinical activities such as population health management and care coordination)?
Participants/population: Physicians
Intervention(s)/exposure(s): Physician productivity measures or models implemented or tested with real-world data (ie, wRVUs)
Comparator(s): Any other measure or model of physician productivity (ie, team-based care measures, value-based care models, measures of other physician efforts including population health management, and/or care coordination)
Outcome(s): Health care quality outcomes, productivity outcomes (ie, workload, time spent in clinical activities), patient-reported outcomes, cost, care coordination outcomes, or unintended consequences
Setting: Ambulatory care, including care delivered via telehealth
The scope of this report is an update of Evidence Map of Tai Chi and will include the following: an evidence map that provides a visual overview of the distribution of evidence (both what is known and where there is little or no evidence base) for tai chi/qigong for certain conditions, and an accompanying narrative that helps stakeholders interpret the state of the evidence to inform policy and clinical decision-making. This update will include more conditions of interest to VA stakeholders.
Participants/population: Adults
Intervention(s)/exposure(s): Tai chi, qigong (baduanjin)
Comparator(s): Comparators include sham, placebo, usual care, other active therapies.
Context: Any health care setting
Outcome(s): The outcomes of interest are health outcomes and adverse events
The scope of this report is an update of a previous map conducted in 2016 that will include the following: an evidence map that provides a visual overview of the distribution of evidence for massage for non-pain conditions, and an accompanying narrative that helps stakeholders interpret the state of the evidence to inform policy and clinical decision-making. This update will include more conditions of interest to VA stakeholders.
Participants/population: Adults
Intervention(s)/exposure(s): Not self-delivered massage therapy, acupressure, and myofascial therapy, which could include but is not limited to sports massage, manual lymph drainage, etc. Reviews of osteopathic manipulative medicine and needling are excluded. Reviews of cupping and myofascial rolling as single approaches are excluded.
Comparator(s): Comparators include sham, placebo, usual care, other active therapies.
Context: Any health care setting
Outcome(s): Non-pain related health outcomes and adverse events. Additional outcomes might include use of medications, health care services utilization.
KQ: What AI-assisted techniques have been investigated for prostate, breast, lung, and colorectal cancer screening and diagnosis?
Population: Adults undergoing screening or diagnostic tests for prostate, breast, lung, or colorectal cancer (including for staging purposes)
Intervention: AI-assisted techniques for cancer screening or diagnosis
Comparator: Non-AI-assisted techniques for cancer screening or diagnosis
Outcomes:
Diagnostic accuracy (area under the curve [AUC], sensitivity/specificity, etc)
Implementation outcomes (provider training and uptake, efficiency, healthcare staff satisfaction, patient experience, etc)
Harms or unintended consequences (overdiagnosis, provider skill loss, etc)
Study Design: Comparative studies (multiple-group or before-after designs) published 2020–present
KQ1: What are the benefits and harms of virtual reality (VR) interventions for treating mental health disorders?
KQ2: What are the benefits and harms of VR interventions for suicide prevention?
Participants/population:
KQ1: Adults with:
Posttraumatic stress disorder
Generalized anxiety disorder
Panic disorder
Agoraphobia
Specific phobia
Social anxiety disorder (Social phobia)
Major depressive disorder
Persistent depressive disorder (Dysthymia)
Premenstrual dysphoric disorder
Bipolar disorder
Schizophrenia
Schizoaffective disorder
Other schizophrenia spectrum and psychotic disorders
Dissociative disorders
Obsessive compulsive disorder
Substance use disorders (any; e.g. alcohol use disorder, opioid use disorder)
KQ2: Adults
Intervention(s)/exposure(s): Fully immersive (all-encompassing three-dimensional space that is visually sealed off from the physical environment) VR interventions to treat mental health disorders (KQ1) or prevent suicide (KQ2)
Comparator(s): Any intervention
Context: Any
Outcome(s): Symptom severity, treatment response, recovery, quality of life, treatment engagement (e.g. initiation of treatment, retention in treatment), suicidal ideation and/or behaviors, adverse events
KQ: To identify and compare and contrast published studies that make conclusions about the quality of medical care delivered by hospitalists in VA hospital general medical wards compared with care provided in other inpatient settings.
Participants/population: Patients receiving care from VA or non-VA providers, in the following hierarchy: Veterans receiving care in VA and Veterans receiving care in the community as part of the CHOICE or MISSION Act; Veterans receiving care in VA and Veterans receiving care in the community not as part of CHOICE or MISSION; Veterans receiving care in VA and general population patients receiving care in the community
Intervention(s)/exposure(s): Care received from VA
Comparator(s): Community care
Context: Veteran and non-VA US health care providers
Outcome(s): Quality in any of the IOM domains: clinical quality, safety, efficiency, access, patient experience, equity
KQ1a: Quantitative associations of nurse work environment characteristics on nurse-rated health care quality and safety
What is the impact of nurse work environment characteristics on nurse-rated health care quality and safety?
KQ1b: Qualitative views about nurse work environment on nurse-perceived health care quality and safety
How do nurses perceive that their work environment impacts health care quality and safety?
KQ2: Mapping of nurse work environment interventions on nurse-rated health care quality and safety
What nurse work environment interventions or strategies are available to improve on nurse-rated health care quality and safety?
Participants/population: Nurses (ie, RN) providing care to adults in the inpatient or outpatient health care setting
NOTE: If study population is comprised of a mix of nursing professionals of interest (eg, advanced practice nurses and RN; pediatric and adult care nurses), and do not include relevant population subgroups, studies will be included if they have 80% or more of nursing professionals who meet eligibility
Intervention(s)/exposure(s):
KQ1a & b: Nurse work environment characteristics identified by nurse that may impact nurse-rated health care quality and/or safety.
KQ2: Interventions or strategies deployed at a clinic or higher level and focused on aspects of the nurse work environment and impacts on nurse-rated health care quality and/or safety.
Nurse work environment must encompass one of the following elements:
Comparator(s):
KQ1: Any or no comparators
KQ2:
Context:
Outcome(s):
KQ1a & KQ2:
KQ1b: Nursing staff experiences or perceptions of how nurse work environment influences
