The Influence of Social Support in PROMs of Patients with COPD in Primary Care: A Scoping Review

Abstract

Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) is a prevalent and multidimensional disease with symptoms that greatly influence patients’ health. Healthcare professionals utilize patient-reported outcome measures (PROMs) to classify and better manage the disease. Despite the value of PROMs, they inadequately represent some important dimensions of COPD, like social support and healthcare access/utilization. This is important, especially for social support, since it can positively influence PROMs results and the overall health of patients with COPD. Therefore, a scoping review was conducted to determine how social support affects PROMs of patients with COPD in primary care. The PRISMA–Scoping approach was adopted, and we sought articles published in MEDLINE and COHRANE. We screened 2038 articles for inclusion and finally included a total of 10 articles. Most of the articles were conducted in the U.S. and Norway. Social support had a strong positive impact on PROMs. Additionally, different types of social support were observed. Moreover, higher levels of social support were linked to better quality of life, mental health, self-care behaviors, self-management, functionality, and less severe COPD. Consequently, this scoping review highlights the value of social support in patients with COPD and its underrepresentation and misrepresentation in PROMs literature.