Physician Perspectives on Comparative Effectiveness Research: Implications for Practice-based Evidence

Comparative effectiveness research (CER) is defined by the Institute of Medicine as “the generation and synthesis of evidence that compares the benefits and harms of alternative methods to prevent, diagnose, treat, and monitor a clinical condition or to improve the delivery of care.” The goal of CER is to provide timely, useful evidence to healthcare decision makers including physicians, patients, policymakers, and payers. A prime focus for the use of CER evidence is the interaction between physician and patient. Physicians in primary practice are critical to the success of the CER enterprise. A 2009 survey suggests, however, that physician attitudes toward CER may be mixed—somewhat positive toward the potential for patient care improvement, yet negative toward potential restriction on physician freedom of practice. CER methods and goals closely parallel those of practice-based research, an important movement in family medicine in the United States since the 1970s. This article addresses apparent physician ambivalence toward CER and makes a case for family medicine engagement in CER to produce useful practice-based evidence. Such an effort has potential to expand care options through personalized medicine, individualized guidelines, focus on patient preferences and patient-reported outcomes, and study of complex therapeutic interventions, such as integrative care. Academic medical researchers will need to collaborate with experienced family physicians to identify significant practice-based research questions and design meaningful studies. Such collaborations would shape CER to produce high-quality practice-based evidence to inform family and community medicine.