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PCORI

Patient-Centered Outcomes Research Institute

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    About Us

    • Our Programs
    • Governance
    • Financials and Reports
    • Procurement Opportunities
    • Our Staff
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    Fact Sheets: Learn More About PCORI

    Download fact sheets about out work, the research we fund, and our programs and initiatives.

    Find It Fast

    Browse through an alphabetical list of frequently accessed and searched terms for information and resources.

    Subscribe to PCORI Email Alerts

    Sign up for weekly emails to stay current on the latest results of our funded projects, and more.

  • Research & Results
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    Research & Results

    • Explore Our Portfolio
    • Research Fundamentals
    • Research Results Highlights
    • Putting Evidence to Work
    • Peer Review
    • Evidence Synthesis
    • About Our Research

    Evidence Updates from PCORI-Funded Studies

    These updates capture highlights of findings from systematic reviews and our funded research studies.

    Journal Articles About Our Funded Research

    Browse through a collection of journal publications that provides insights into PCORI-funded work.

    Explore Our Portfolio of Funded Projects

    Find out about projects based on the health conditions they focus on, the state they are in, and if they have results.

  • Topics
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    Topics

    • Addressing Disparities
    • Arthritis
    • Asthma
    • Cancer
    • Cardiovascular Disease
    • Children's Health
    • Community Health Workers
    • COVID-19
    • Dementia and Cognitive Impairment
    • Diabetes
    • Kidney Disease
    • Medicaid
    • Men's Health
    • Mental and Behavioral Health
    • Minority Mental Health
    • Multiple Chronic Conditions
    • Multiple Sclerosis
    • Obesity
    • Older Adults' Health
    • Pain Care and Opioids
    • Rare Diseases
    • Rural Health
    • Shared Decision Making
    • Telehealth
    • Transitional Care
    • Veterans Health
    • Women's Health

    Featured Topic: Women's Health

    Learn more about the projects we support on conditions that specifically or more often affect women.

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    Engagement

    • The Value of Engagement
    • Engagement in Health Research Literature Explorer
    • Influencing the Culture of Research
    • Engagement Awards
    • Engagement Resources
    • Engage with Us

    Engagement Tools and Resources for Research

    This searchable peer-to-peer repository includes resources that can inform future work in patient-centered outcomes research.

    Explore Engagement in Health Literature

    This tool enables searching for published articles about engagement in health research.

    Research Fundamentals: A New On-Demand Training

    It enables those new to health research or patient-centered research to learn more about the research process.

  • Funding Opportunities
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    Funding Opportunities

    • What & Who We Fund
    • What You Need to Know to Apply
    • Applicant Training
    • Merit Review
    • Awardee Resources
    • Help Center

    PCORI Funding Opportunities

    View and learn about the newly opened funding announcements and the upcoming PFAs in 2021.

    Tips for Submitting a Responsive LOI

    Find out what PCORI looks for in a letter of intent (LOI) along with other helpful tips.

    PCORI Awardee Resources

    These resources can help awardees in complying with the terms and conditions of their contract.

  • Meetings & Events
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    Meetings & Events

    • Upcoming
    • Past Events

    PCORI Webinar: February 2, 2pm ET

    Hear from PCORI leaders about ways to get involved in PCOR, improvements to our funding opportunities, and more. Register

    Confronting COVID-19: A Webinar Series

    Learn more about the series and access recordings and summary reports of all six sessions.

    2020 PCORI Annual Meeting

    Watch recordings of all sessions, and view titles and descriptions of the posters presented at the virtual meeting.

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  • Research & Results
  • Evidence Synthesis

Evidence Synthesis

When patients, clinicians, or other healthcare stakeholders raise a question that doesn’t already have an evidence-based answer, sometimes new research is needed to answer it. But in other cases, a careful look at results from research studies already completed can more quickly provide findings that patients and those who care for them can use to make informed choices.

PCORI’s Evidence Synthesis Initiative takes that approach. The program includes rigorous reviews of the best evidence available on topics of critical concern to patients and other healthcare stakeholders. The goal is to synthesize all relevant completed studies on a particular clinical question in order to provide evidence that is stronger and more certain than the results of the individual studies.

Our Evidence Synthesis Initiative falls within our broader research synthesis efforts, which take advantage of a wide variety of tools to pull together and analyze results for public use. We are using two key approaches. One is conducting systematic reviews of results of already completed comparative clinical effectiveness research (CER) studies and other methodologic approaches that share an underlying foundational method on topics of critical concern to patients and other healthcare stakeholders. The other is reanalyzing data from already completed studies to discover which specific patient groups gain the most or least benefits—or are at greater or lesser risk for harms—from an intervention. Once we have synthesized the evidence, we will disseminate it through products, below, that are designed to meet the needs of our various stakeholder groups.

Systematic Reviews

The most common type of evidence synthesis is the systematic review, which features a set of clearly specified, rigorous, reproducible, and transparent methods.

Evidence Maps and Evidence Visualizations

Evidence maps and evidence visualizations are visual evidence synthesis products, which take complex data from health studies and present this data visually, to make the data easier to understand and use.

Meta-analysis

A meta-analysis typically summarizes the average treatment effect for the entire study population using statistical methods.

Emerging Technologies and Therapeutics Reports

The reports offer summaries of evidence supporting new drugs, devices, and other healthcare technologies that are in use or may be available soon in the United States.

PCORI Health Care Horizon Scanning System

The Health Care Horizon Scanning System provides a systematic process to identify healthcare interventions that have high potential to alter the current standard of care.

Other Secondary Data Reuse Opportunities

There are other approaches that can be helpful in studies with a diverse group of people and a wide range in individual responses to an intervention.

Topic Briefs

Topic Briefs identify and categorize the existing effectiveness and comparative effectiveness literature on a medical issue.

Download Fact Sheet


Posted: October 27, 2017; Updated: December 23, 2019

About Us

  • Our Programs
  • Governance
  • Financials and Reports
  • Procurement Opportunities
  • Our Staff
  • Our Vision & Mission
  • Contact Us

Research & Results

  • Explore Our Portfolio
  • Research Fundamentals
  • Research Results Highlights
  • Putting Evidence to Work
  • Peer Review
  • Evidence Synthesis
  • About Our Research

Engagement

  • The Value of Engagement
  • Engagement in Health Research Literature Explorer
  • Influencing the Culture of Research
  • Engagement Awards
  • Engagement Resources
  • Engage with Us

Funding Opportunities

  • What & Who We Fund
  • What You Need to Know to Apply
  • Applicant Training
  • Merit Review
  • Awardee Resources
  • Help Center

Meetings & Events

February 2
PCORI 2021 and Beyond: Opportunities for Funding and Involvement in Patient-Centered Research
February 9
Board of Governors Meeting: February 9, 2021
February 11
Advisory Panel on Patient Engagement Winter 2021 Meeting

PCORI

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Patient-Centered Outcomes
Research Institute

1828 L Street, NW, Suite 900
Washington, DC 20036
Phone: (202) 827-7700 | Fax: (202) 355-9558
[email protected]

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