Patient Decision-making Behavior

BACKGROUND: As healthcare technology and medical therapies proliferate, healthcare providers have more options to offer and patients have more options from which to choose. Active patient participation in healthcare decision making is a relatively new phenomenon that has been born of sociocultural, ethical, and legal influences. Patients, however, often find healthcare decisions bewildering, stressful, and anxiety-provoking. OBJECTIVES: The purpose of this review is to provide a framework for those interested in pursuing patient decision-making investigations and suggest ways in which current knowledge can be extended to develop a scientific platform upon which to build decision support interventions. METHOD: Literature review. DISCUSSION: This review (a) provides a context for understanding patient decision making; (b) explicates the state of the science of patient decision making; (c) identifies significant theoretical, methodological, and measurement issues; and, (d) identifies gaps in patient decision-making knowledge and propose areas for further investigation.