An Analysis of the Sensitivity and Stability of Patients' Preferences Can Lead to More Appropriate Medical Decisions.

Patients are faced with multiple alternatives when selecting the preferred method for colorectal cancer screening, and there are multiple criteria to be considered in the decision-making process. We model patients’ choices using a multicriteria decision model, specifically an Analytic Hierarchy Process-based model, and propose a new approach for characterizing the idiosyncratic preference regions for individual patients. The new approach involves the development of a personalized sensitivity and stability analysis of preferences that provides pertinent insights about the changes that occur in a patient’s preferences, as he/she learns additional relevant medical information. We show how the insights derived from the sensitivity and stability of patients’ preferences could be used by a healthcare provider within the medical decision-making process.