Monthly PROVE Seminars

Establishing the Minimal Important Difference

Major international health policy and regulatory authorities have recognizedthe importance of the use of Patient Reported Outcome Measures (PROMs) in clinical research and, to an increasing extent, in clinical practice. Despite the proliferation of PROMs there are substantial challenges in interpreting their results. Users of PROM results -including clinicians, guideline developers and patients -often have no intuitive notion whether an apparent treatment effect is trivial in magnitude, small but important, moderate or large. To address this problem, researchers developed the concept of the minimal important difference (MID): the smallest change in an outcome, either positive or negative, that patients perceive as important. By the end of this talk, the audience will understand 1) what an MID is, 2) why the MID is important, 3) the common approaches used to establish an MID and their strengths and limitations.

Dr. Voineskos is an Associate Professor in the Division of Plastic Surgery and an Investigator at the Li Ka Shing Knowledge Institute at the University of Toronto. He completed his plastic surgery residency training at McMaster University, Canada.