Pola Hahlweg

• PhD
• Research group leader at University Medical Center Hamburg - Eppendorf

Background and objectives: Aid in dying (AID) means assisting a person in their voluntary death. Despite a trend toward AID legalization, knowledge on how AID decisions (should) unfold is limited. We synthesized the current scientific understanding of interactional AID decision-making processes in the healthcare context. Methods: For this scoping r...

Introduction The collaboRATETM measure assesses the shared decision‐making process from patients' perspective with three items. Because of its shortness, it is especially feasible in routine care. It was developed in English and has been translated into several languages. This study aimed to translate collaboRATE into German, test its comprehensibi...

Background We previously developed the EPAT-64, a patient-reported experience measure designed to assess patient-centeredness (PC) across 16 dimensions of the validated integrative model of PC. While its modular structure makes it highly adaptable to examine certain dimensions of PC, generating an overall PC score requires assessing all 64 items. T...

Background Patient-reported experience measures (PREMs) are valuable tools to evaluate patient-centredness (PC) from the patients’ perspective. Despite their utility, a comprehensive PREM addressing PC has been lacking. To bridge this gap, we developed the preliminary version of the Experienced Patient-Centeredness Questionnaire (EPAT), a disease-g...

Introduction Shared decision-making has been adopted at policy levels yet its definition and implementation are debated in clinical practice. We aimed to generate a definition that views shared decision-making from the perspective of clinicians, and the work they need to accomplish it, by addressing some of the most commonly voiced hurdles. Method...

Introduction Providing audio recordings of their own medical encounters to patients has shown promising benefits in addressing information needs of patients. It can aid the recall of medical information and thus contribute to patient-centeredness and shared decision-making. This intervention is explored globally, but limited research pertains to Ge...

Introduction Aid in dying (AID) means supporting a person in hastening their death voluntarily. Decision-making on this existential, very personal, and ethically complex issue is a major challenge and communication between people seeking AID and health care professionals is an important aspect. Thus, we aimed to explore the current state regarding...

Introduction Patient-reported experience measures (PREMs) are useful tools to assess patient- centeredness (PC) from the patients’ perspective and thereby enable improvement of PC. We developed the Experienced Patient-Centeredness Questionnaire (EPAT) based on an integrative model of PC which includes 16 domains.1–3 The EPAT is disease-generic and...

Introduction Patient-centered care (PCC) is a key principle of high-quality health care. Chile has declared PCC as a fundamental pillar of its health care system. However, PCC implementation in the Chilean health care system still lags behind. In order to promote PCC, a series of workshops was held in Santiago de Chile that aimed to transfer knowle...

Background The provision of audio recordings of their own medical encounters to patients, termed consultation recordings, has demonstrated promising benefits, particularly in addressing information needs of cancer patients. While this intervention has been explored globally, there is limited research specific to Germany. This study investigates the...

Über das eigene Lebensende autonom bestimmen zu können, ist der Wunsch vieler Menschen. Höchste Gerichte in Deutschland und Österreich erkennen das Recht auf assistierten Suizid als eine Form des selbstbestimmten Sterbens an. In der Schweiz tragen Sterbehilfeorganisationen zu einer breiteren Akzeptanz bei. Wie aber ist die Suizidhilfe ethisch zu re...

Background Patient-reported experience measures (PREMs) are valuable tools for evaluating patient-centeredness (PC) from the patients' perspective. Despite their utility, a comprehensive PREM addressing PC has been lacking. To bridge this gap, we developed the preliminary version of the Experienced Patient-Centeredness Questionnaire (EPAT), a disea...

Background There is a need for better implementation of patient‐centred (PC) communication and shared decision‐making (SDM) in routine cancer care. Objective The aim of this study was to assess whether a programme to implement SDM in oncology had effects on PC communication in clinical encounters. Design This study constitutes a secondary analysi...

[This corrects the article DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0282283.].

Shared decision-making as part of patient-centeredness is a key element of high-quality healthcare. It describes a communication process between healthcare professionals and patients in which a shared decision is made based on shared information about evidence-based diagnostic and/or therapeutic procedures and the preferences, values, and needs of...

Background Shared decision-making (SDM) is highly relevant in oncology but rarely implemented in routine care. In a stepped-wedge cluster randomized implementation trial, the outcome evaluation of a theoretically and empirically based multi-component SDM implementation program did not show a statistically significant effect on patient-reported SDM...

Several approaches to and definitions of ‘shared decision making’ (SDM) exist, which makes measurement challenging. Recently, a skills network approach was proposed, which conceptualizes SDM competence as an organized network of interacting SDM skills. With this approach, it was possible to accurately predict observer-rated SDM competence of physic...

Introduction For women with unintended pregnancy, access to high-quality care has been found limited due to social stigma and legal restrictions, especially when seeking abortion. To foster person-centeredness (PC), recognising the experiences and needs of women is the first premise. This study aims to (1) identify relevant dimensions of PC (2) eva...

The main focus of this paper is to describe the development and current state of policy, research and implementation of patient-centered care (PCC) and shared decision-making (SDM) in Germany. What is the current state in health policy? Since 2013, the Law on Patients' Rights has standardized all rights and responsibilities regarding medical care f...

Introduction To effectively foster patient‐centeredness (PC), it is crucial to measure its implementation. So far, there is no German measure to assess PC comprehensively. The aim of this study is to develop and select items for the Experienced Patient‐Centeredness (EPAT) Questionnaire, a patient‐reported experience measure (PREM). The EPAT intends...

Background Shared decision-making (SDM) is preferred by many patients in cancer care. However, despite scientific evidence and promotion by health policy makers, SDM implementation in routine health care lags behind. This study aimed to evaluate an empirically and theoretically grounded implementation program for SDM in cancer care. Methods In a s...

Patient-centeredness is an important feature of high-quality health care. The integrative model of patient-centeredness describes a total of 15 dimensions. A central aspect is shared decision-making (SDM), which describes the joint agreement between physician and patient regarding diagnostic or therapeutic decisions. Although many patients with can...

Background Shared decision-making (SDM) between patients and healthcare professionals (HCPs) is a key component of patient-centred care. To implement SDM in clinical practice and to evaluate its effects, it is helpful to know about HCPs’ perception of SDM barriers. The measure IcanSDM was developed in Canada and assesses the perception of SDM barri...

Background Measurement of physicians’ competence in shared decision making (SDM) remains challenging with frequent disagreement between assessment methods. Objective To conceptualize and measure physicians’ SDM competence as an organized network of behavioural skills and to determine whether processing patient‐reported data according to this model...

Background Patients are often not actively engaged in medical encounters. Short interventions like Ask 3 Questions (Ask3Q) can increase patient participation in decision‐making. Up to now, Ask3Q was not available in German. Objective To translate Ask3Q and evaluate its acceptability and feasibility. Methods We translated and adapted several Engli...

Objectives To translate the Organisational Readiness for Implementing Change measure into German and assess its psychometric properties. Design Cross-sectional psychometric study based on secondary analysis of baseline data from a shared decision-making implementation study. Setting Three departments within one academic cancer centre in Hamburg,...

Background: We aimed to analyze preferred and perceived levels of patients’ involvement in treatment decision-making in a representative sample of cancer patients. Material and Methods: We conducted a multicenter, epidemiological cross-sectional study with a stratified random sample based on the incidence of cancer diagnoses in Germany. Data were c...

Objective Patient-centredness (PC) has particularly grown in relevance in health services research as well as in politics and there has been much research on its conceptualisation. However, conceptual work neglected the patients’ perspective. Thus, it remains unclear which dimensions of PC matter most to patients. This study aims to assess relevanc...

Purpose Shared decision-making is currently not widely implemented in breast cancer care. Encounter decision aids support shared decision-making by helping patients and physicians compare treatment options. So far, little was known about adaptation needs for translated encounter decision aids, and encounter decision aids for breast cancer treatment...

Introduction The impact of patient centredness (PC) in healthcare has grown over the years. However, conceptualisations of PC are heterogeneous. Existing patient-reported measures of PC have shown inconsistencies and shortcomings. This impedes the comparison of results across studies. To foster PC, it is important to know which dimensions matter mo...

Background: Shared decision-making (SDM) has become increasingly important in health care. However, despite scientific evidence, effective implementation strategies, and a prominent position on the health policy agenda, SDM is not widely implemented in routine practice so far. Therefore, we developed a program for routine implementation of SDM in...

Background: Shared decision-making (SDM) is poorly implemented in routine care, despite being promoted by health policies. No reviews have solely focused on an in-depth synthesis of the literature around organizational- and system-level characteristics (i.e., characteristics of healthcare organizations and of healthcare systems) that may affect SD...

Background The quality of decision-making in multidisciplinary team meetings (MDTMs) depends on the quality of information presented and the quality of team processes. Few studies have examined these factors using a standardized approach. The aim of this study was to objectively document the processes involved in decision-making in MDTMs, document...

Objectives Shared decision-making has continuously gained importance over the last years. However, few studies have investigated the current state of shared decision-making implementation in routine cancer care. This study aimed to investigate how treatment decisions are made in routine cancer care and to explore barriers and facilitators to shared...

Objective: This study aimed a) to investigate knowledge, attitudes, and self-reported use of shared decision-making (SDM) among physiotherapists in Germany, b) to explore their association with demographic characteristics, and c) to assess barriers to the implementation of SDM. Methods: We assessed above mentioned domains using an online survey....

Background: Shared decision making (SDM) is particularly relevant in oncology, where complex treatment options with varying side effects may lead to meaningful changes in the patient’s quality of life. For several years, health policies have called for the implementation of SDM, but SDM remains poorly implemented in routine clinical practice. Imple...

Background Despite an increased awareness of shared decision-making (SDM) and its prominent position on the health policy agenda, its implementation in routine care remains a challenge in Germany. In order to overcome this challenge, it is important to understand healthcare providers’ views regarding SDM and to take their perspectives and opinions...

Background: Multidisciplinary team meetings and shared decision-making are potential means of delivering patient-centred care. Not much is known about how those two paradigms fit together in cancer care. This study aimed to investigate how decisions are made in multidisciplinary team meetings and whether patient perspectives are incorporated in th...