Statement: PCORI Executive Director Joe Selby on the National Pharmaceutical Council's Fifth Annual Comparative Effectiveness Research Survey

PCORI Executive Director Joe Selby, MD, MPH, issued the following statement about today's release of the National Pharmaceutical Council’s fifth annual comparative effectiveness research survey.

“With more than 90 percent of respondents agreeing that comparative effectiveness research (CER) is important for our nation’s healthcare, the National Pharmaceutical Council’s fifth annual CER survey reaffirms the need for evidence that helps patients and those who care for them make better informed decisions.

“We’re pleased that those surveyed identified PCORI as the clear leader in setting CER priorities, establishing research standards, and funding studies.

“We believe this reflects the significant progress PCORI has made over a short time to produce and implement strong methodology standards and fund more than $700 million to support CER addressing a range of priority areas.

All of our initiatives – including our pragmatic clinical studies initiative and our efforts to build PCORnet, a national patient-centered clinical data research network – aim to generate real-world evidence about what works best for which patients. We’ll begin to see the first results of the CER studies we’ve funded later this year. We look forward to working with our many partners to disseminate and implement the results.

“We’re grateful to the National Pharmaceutical Council for its work to assess the impact of CER. This survey provides an opportunity to reflect on our collective progress and the work ahead to answer through CER the questions that matter most to patients, their caregivers, and healthcare providers.”