This PCORI Funding Announcement (PFA) is intended to promote the targeted implementation and systematic uptake of shared decision making (SDM) in healthcare settings, in line with PCORI’s goal of supporting patients in making informed decisions about their care. For this PFA, PCORI defines an SDM strategy as an intervention or approach that draws on and presents evidence to inform patients of available treatment options and their risks and benefits, and either engages patients in a decision-making process with their clinician or promotes their ability to engage in such a process.

This initiative will support projects that propose active, multi-component approaches to implementing effective shared decision making strategies that address existing barriers and obstacles to uptake and maintenance of shared decision making. The SDM strategy must have demonstrated effectiveness on patient, caregiver, or healthcare provider decision making using widely accepted metrics; the corresponding implementation approach must have potential for use and scalability beyond the targeted implementation setting. Patients and others whose involvement is central to success of the proposed project should be involved in its design and execution. In addition, applicants should assure that the proposed project team draws on sufficient expertise in both shared decision making and implementation science. Projects must incorporate rigorous evaluation of the implementation of shared decision making approaches, as well as the impact of the shared decision making processes in the targeted settings.

To be eligible for this PFA, applicants may either a) propose to implement a shared decision making (SDM) strategy that was formally tested and demonstrated to be effective in the context of a PCORI research award, or b) propose an implementation project that will incorporate new PCORI CER evidence into an existing, tested shared decision making strategy, and then implement the updated shared decision making strategy. Applicants proposing to implement a PCORI-funded SDM strategy must either be the PI of the original PCORI-funded study or be a member of the project team. Applicants proposing to incorporate findings from a PCORI-funded study (or studies) into an existing and effective SDM strategy can search from a list of completed PCORI-funded projects with results, which can be found here.