This Article Full Text Full Text (PDF) Alert me when this article is cited Alert me if a correction is posted Citation Map Services Email this article to a friend Similar articles in this journal Alert me to new issues of the journal Download to citation manager Request Permissions Google Scholar Articles by Kosiborod, M. Articles by Spertus, J. A. PubMed Articles by Kosiborod, M. Articles by Spertus, J. A. Related Collections Health policy and outcome research

(Circulation. 2009;120:76-81.)
© 2009 American Heart Association, Inc.

Careers in Cardiovascular Research

Careers in Cardiovascular Outcomes Research

Mikhail Kosiborod, MD; John A. Spertus, MD, MPH

From the Mid America Heart Institute of Saint Luke’s Hospital, Kansas City, Mo (M.K., J.A.S.); and University of Missouri-Kansas City (M.K., J.A.S.).

Correspondence to John A. Spertus, MD, MPH, Mid America Heart Institute of Saint Luke’s Hospital, 4401 Wornall Rd, Kansas City, MO 64111. E-mail spertusj@umkc.edu

Key Words: cardiovascular diseases • outcomes research • training

An extract of the first 250 words of the full text is provided, because this article has no abstract.

	Introduction

 
To best understand the field and goals of outcomes research, it is important to appreciate the challenges that confront our healthcare system. Although considerable advances in patient care have been made over the last several decades, patients, physicians, and payers continue to struggle with rising costs and inefficiencies, poor application of evidence to clinical care, fragmentation, misaligned incentives, disparities, suboptimal patient safety, and lack of patient-centeredness. In its seminal 2001 report, Crossing the Quality Chasm: A New Health System for the Twenty-first Century, the Institute of Medicine concluded that the US healthcare system has fallen far short of its potential to deliver care in a safe, timely, equitable, efficient, evidence-based or patient-centered manner.¹ They called for a complete redesign of the way in which we currently practice and deliver care. The field of outcomes research is ideally positioned to address most of these challenges.

Outcomes research focuses on what is ultimately achieved by our efforts in healthcare. It seeks not only to describe the "end-result of healthcare" (patient outcomes) and its determinants but also to develop solutions to improve the outcomes by aligning the needs of patients with the performance of physicians and the healthcare system with the use of available resources.^2,3 The field of outcomes research ranges from everyday clinical decision making that affects individual physicians and patients to population science, health economics, and policy. As such, outcomes research lies at the interface of multiple scientific disciplines, including clinical epidemiology, biostatistics, qualitative research, behavioral science, organizational theory, ethics, . . . [Full Text of this Article]