Evidence map›Paper›PMID 40680294›Full record

ArticleJournal of the American Medical Informatics Association : JAMIA2025

Comparing patient-reported symptoms and structured clinician documentation in electronic health records.

Victor M Castro, Vivian S Gainer, Danielle M Crookes, Shawn N Murphy, Justin Manjourides

Abstract readComparative Study
In one paragraph

Article in Journal of the American Medical Informatics Association : JAMIA, 2025. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 3 papers.

0numbers the graph read from it
0cells of the map it votes in
3citing papers in PubMed
–field-weighted citation impact
1 · What the graph read from it

What it found

Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.

The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.

2 · The registry

The trial behind it

Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.

Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.

3 · Its place in the literature

Who cites it

3 citing papers in PubMed.

  1. Article
  2. Article
  3. Symptom burden in cancer survivorship: insights from a survivorship program's patient-reported outcomes database.Quality of life research : an international journal of quality of life aspects of treatment, care and rehabilitation · 2026
    Article
4 · The record

Corrections and comments

PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.

5 · Who and what money

Authors and funding

5 authors.

Victor M CastroDepartment of Public Health and Health Sciences, Bouvé College of Health Sciences, Northeastern University, Boston, MA, 02115, United States.
Vivian S GainerResearch Information Science and Computing, Mass General Brigham, Somerville, MA, 02145, United States.
Danielle M CrookesDepartment of Public Health and Health Sciences, Bouvé College of Health Sciences, Northeastern University, Boston, MA, 02115, United States.
Shawn N MurphyResearch Information Science and Computing, Mass General Brigham, Somerville, MA, 02145, United States.
Justin ManjouridesDepartment of Public Health and Health Sciences, Bouvé College of Health Sciences, Northeastern University, Boston, MA, 02115, United States.ORCID 0000-0002-2454-4489

Funding

Mass General Brigham Institutional Funds
6 · The paper itself

Abstract

objectivesReal-world data (RWD) analyses primarily rely on structured clinical documentation collected through routine clinical care or driven by medical billing requirements. Patient-reported outcome measures (PROMs), integrated into electronic health records (EHRs), are an additional data source that could offer valuable insights into a patient's perspective and contribute to a more comprehensive understanding of health outcomes in RWD studies. This study aims to characterize agreement between PROMs symptoms and structured clinical documentation of these symptoms by clinicians in EHRs. MATERIALS AND

methodsA cross-sectional study of 913 244 adult primary care annual physical visits between January 1, 2019 and December 31, 2023. We compared differences in prevalence and agreement of patient-reported symptoms (PRS) and structured clinician documentation (CD) across 15 respiratory, gastrointestinal, cardiometabolic, and neuropsychiatric symptoms.

resultsPatient-reported symptom prevalence were significantly higher compared to CD across most symptoms including joint pain (33% PRS vs 12%), headaches (17% PRS vs 8.8% CD), and sleep disturbance (24% PRS vs 10% CD). Clinicians documented anxiety (11% PRS vs 23% CD) and depression (6.6% PRS vs 15.4% CD) symptoms using structured code at higher rates than patients reported them. Agreement between symptom self-report and clinician-documented structured codes was low to moderate (κ: 0.06-0.39). DISCUSSION: Primary care patients self-report symptoms up to ten times more frequently than clinicians document them with structured codes in the EHR.

conclusionThis work demonstrates the value and feasibility of incorporating PRSs in RWD studies to reduce misclassification and more holistically capture a patient's health.

Indexed as

DocumentationElectronic Health RecordsPatient Reported Outcome MeasuresAdultAgedCross-Sectional StudiesFemaleHumansMaleMiddle AgedPrimary Health Careelectronic health recordspatient-reported outcome measuresprimary carereal-world data

Identifiers

PMID40680294
PMCPMC12361852

What OpenQuestion holds

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Registered trials

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Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.