Writing Down Goals

The women's health IPU at UT Health Austin is happy with having patients write down their goals at their first visit and then tracking those. It would be interesting to study people seeking musculoskeletal specialty care to determine whether asking patients what result of their care would be rated a success helps direct the clinician-patient interaction in a more fruitful direction compared to the usual clinical interaction.

Study Overview

• Status: Withdrawn
• Conditions: Musculoskeletal Diseases
• Intervention / Treatment: Behavioral: Writing down goals

Detailed Description

People's stated preferences are often inconsistent with what matters most to them (their values). And they are often based on misconceptions, distress, and less effective cognitive coping strategies. For instance, a person might say "My goal is to have no pain" when that is not possible. Or they might say "My goal is to get the shot that fixes this" when there is no such shot. It may go without saying that people want: "To be able to live a normal lifestyle" and "To be able to accomplish most of their goals." In other words, people want to be able to be themselves. They are seeking care because they are not able to be themselves or they are concerned that they may not be able to be themselves. The word health comes from an old German word meaning "whole."

One part of good health is correcting or alleviating pathophysiology (e.g. reading glasses). Another part of good health is evolving one's inner narrative (e.g. "I'm older now and need glasses to read").

The women's health IPU at UT Health Austin is happy with having patients write down their goals at their first visit and then tracking those. It would be interesting to study people seeking musculoskeletal specialty care to determine whether asking patients what result of their care would be rated a success helps direct the clinician-patient interaction in a more fruitful direction compared to the usual clinical interaction.

• Study Type: Interventional
• Phase: Not Applicable

Contacts and Locations

Participation Criteria

Eligibility Criteria

• Ages Eligible for Study: 18 years to 89 years (Adult, Older Adult)
• Accepts Healthy Volunteers: No

Description

Inclusion Criteria:

• Adult patients (18+)
• Orthopedic visit

Exclusion Criteria:

• Patients who are illiterate.
• Patients who do not speak English.

Study Plan

How is the study designed?

Design Details

• Primary Purpose: Treatment
• Allocation: Randomized
• Interventional Model: Parallel Assignment
• Masking: None (Open Label)

Number of Arms

2

Arms and Interventions

Participant Group / Arm	Intervention / Treatment
No Intervention: Standard care; Will not write down goals their goals for their medical care (usual care).
Experimental: Writing down goals; Will write down goals their goals for their medical care.	Behavioral: Writing down goals; Patient will write their health goals down before the visit.

What is the study measuring?

Primary Outcome Measures

Outcome Measure	Measure Description	Time Frame
Decision conflict questionnaire	Questionnaire assessing decision conflict	Baseline

Secondary Outcome Measures

Outcome Measure	Measure Description	Time Frame
Decision regret questionnaire	Questionnaire assessing the degree of regret of decision	Baseline
Jefferson Scale of Patient's Perceptions of Physician Empathy	Patient perceived of physician empathy as measured by the JSPPE	Baseline
Patient Activation Measure-13	Patient activation as measured by PAM-13	Baseline
Guttman Satisfaction scale	Questionnaire measuring to what degree patients are satisfied with the care they received.	Baseline

Collaborators and Investigators

• Sponsor: University of Texas at Austin
• Investigators: Principal Investigator: David Ring, MD, PhD, Professor of Surgery, Dell Medical School at The University of Texas at Austin

Study record dates

Study Major Dates

• Study Start (Estimated): September 1, 2025
• Primary Completion (Estimated): October 1, 2025
• Study Completion (Estimated): November 1, 2025

Study Registration Dates

• First Submitted: June 8, 2021
• First Submitted That Met QC Criteria: June 17, 2021
• First Posted (Actual): June 21, 2021

Study Record Updates

• Last Update Posted (Actual): July 31, 2025
• Last Update Submitted That Met QC Criteria: July 28, 2025
• Last Verified: July 1, 2025

More Information

Terms related to this study

• Keywords: Orthopedics; decisional conflict
• Additional Relevant MeSH Terms: Musculoskeletal Diseases
• Other Study ID Numbers: 2019-07-0089

Plan for Individual participant data (IPD)

• Plan to Share Individual Participant Data (IPD)?: NO

Drug and device information, study documents

• Studies a U.S. FDA-regulated drug product: No
• Studies a U.S. FDA-regulated device product: No