urinary tract infections<\/a>. Researchers therefore explored where these perspectives aligned and diverged, with the aim of informing future patient centred clinical trials and improving communication in clinical practice.\u00a0<\/p>\nThe qualitative study involved\u00a0semistructured\u00a0interviews with 12 hospitalised patients with complicated urinary tract infections and 16 clinicians who had cared for them for at least 2 days at two academic hospitals. Interviews were conducted between February and May 2023 and analysed using directed content matrix and team based qualitative methods. The patient cohort\u00a0had\u00a0a median age of 70 years, while clinicians\u00a0had\u00a0a median age of 35 years.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Clinician Perspectives Differed\u00a0from\u00a0Patient Experiences\u00a0<\/p>\n
Analysis\u00a0identified\u00a0four key themes describing differences between patient and clinician perspectives on\u00a0health-related\u00a0quality of life.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Researchers found that clinicians did not consistently recognise the full extent to which symptoms affected patients\u2019 daily functioning. While patients described a broad range of physical, emotional, and functional consequences, clinicians often focused more heavily on medical factors and the\u00a0anticipated\u00a0clinical course, particularly when considering whether symptoms could be attributed directly to the urinary tract infection.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Patients and clinicians also used different language and varying levels of detail when discussing health related quality of life. These differences suggested that important aspects of the patient experience may not always be captured during routine clinical assessment.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Although clinicians\u00a0generally agreed\u00a0that health related quality of life was an important consideration, their confidence and experience in addressing these issues varied considerably.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Supporting More Patient Centred Outcomes\u00a0<\/p>\n
The researchers concluded that\u00a0important differences\u00a0exist between how patients and clinicians perceive and describe the impact of complicated urinary tract infections on\u00a0health related\u00a0quality of life.\u00a0<\/p>\n
They suggested these findings could help inform the development of disease specific patient reported health related quality of life tools for antibacterial clinical trials, enabling outcomes to better reflect\u00a0patients\u2019\u00a0lived experiences. Improved understanding of these differing perspectives may also strengthen patient clinician communication and support more patient centred care for people with complicated urinary tract infections.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Reference\u00a0<\/p>\n
Howard-Anderson J et al.\u00a0Comparing\u00a0patient and clinician\u00a0perceptions\u00a0of health-related quality of life in urinary tract infections. JAMA\u00a0Netw\u00a0Open. 2026;9;(7):e2618822.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Featured image:\u00a0Thitiporn\u00a0on Adobe Stock\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"COMPLICATED\u00a0urinary tract infections\u00a0had a wider impact on\u00a0health-related\u00a0quality of life than clinicians consistently recognised, according to a qualitative study…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":587036,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[103,61,60],"class_list":["post-587035","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-health","tag-health","tag-ie","tag-ireland"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/587035","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=587035"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/587035\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/587036"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=587035"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=587035"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=587035"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}