Patient management scenario: a framework for clinical decision and prognosis.

The depiction of prognosis is one of the main activities and a mainstay in medical practice. In cancer, as in other diseases, the prognosis differs for a variety of situations and evolves with time and with medical interventions. Although most commonly described at diagnosis, prognosis may be defined at any time during the course of the disease and for any endpoint including response to therapy, failure of treatment, survival, or preservation of function, and so forth. To facilitate the accurate portrayal of the future, the prognosis should be defined within a specific setting, referred to as a 'management scenario'. In the concept of a management scenario, the prognosis is defined using systematically considered prognostic factors, interventions and the outcome of interest. A deliberate and careful determination of prognosis is essential to clinical decision making and patient care. We illustrate the use of the concept of management scenario in several clinical examples.