Recommendations to Improve the Quality of Oral Anticancer Medication Use
PQA convened 23 national experts and patients to prioritize opportunities to improve the quality of care for individuals using oral anticancer medications (OAM). The group’s number one measurement priority is a health plan performance measure to assess the degree to which patients take OAMs as prescribed.
This report, Recommendations to Improve the Quality of Oral Anticancer Medication Use, describes the first phase of PQA’s oncology quality initiative, including the environmental scan, key takeaways from the workshops, conclusions and next steps.
PQA convened the group as part of its Quality Innovation and Research Initiative for Oncology. Work on the initiative began in 2022 to identify research and measurement opportunities aimed at assessing the quality of OAM use. PQA invited patients with lived experience, OAM experts, and stakeholders from pharmacies, health plans, health care providers, biopharmaceutical companies, associations and academia to participate in three workshops between late 2022 and early 2023.
PQA will begin research in 2024 to advance the health plan measure concept for adherence or persistence to OAMs. The work is led by the PQA Quality Innovation and Research Center, a strategic initiative to advance progress in medication use quality and focus on clinical outcomes and provider contributions to care.
The prioritization process was informed by an expansive environmental scan conducted by PQA to identify OAM quality gaps and existing measures relevant to OAM care. The scan identified eight quality issues related to OAM use, and a lack of relevant OAM-related quality measures for health plan and pharmacy performance assessment.
This work was possible in part with support from Boehringer Ingelheim, EMD Serono, Hematology/Oncology Pharmacy Association, Jazz Pharmaceuticals, Johnson & Johnson, Novartis and Pfizer.
Download the Report