Introduction. Agreement is lacking on priorities for oral corticosteroids (OCS) treatment outcomes for preschool wheeze. Using a nominal group technique, we aimed to reach a consensus on outcome measures of OCS treatment between health professionals (HPs) and parents.

Methods. We invited two groups (1) HPs including lead authors of OCS preschool wheeze trials and (2) parents of children who had experience of OCS for acute wheeze in children aged 1-6 years. Participants ranked outcome measures in order of importance. Two rounds of votes took place, with a discussion in between. Friedman?s test was used to test differences between the rankings across all items.

Results. 7 HPs and 9 parents participated. In the first vote, length of hospital stay (LOS) and change in wheezing severity score (WSS) were top priority for HPs and parents, respectively. After discussion and second vote both groups agreed by consensus in WSS as primary outcome. Analysis after the second vote showed a statistically significant difference across all rankings (?² (df = 6, N=15) = 45.66, p<0.001). LOS dropped from 2nd to 4th and revisit to GP/emergency department 5th to 2nd post discussion/2nd vote. Whilst LOS was regarded as the most clinically relevant for HPs, parents noted that revisiting the hospital gave them a more substantial psychological/economic burden than longer LOS.

Conclusions. Parents and clinicians conclude that WSS is the most favourable outcome measure, which will be used as a primary outcome for our individual participant data meta-analysis. Parent/patient engagement is key to ensuring relevant patient research outcomes.