Dataset Information

Canada-wide mixed methods analysis evaluating the reasons for inappropriate emergency department presentation in patients with a history of atrial fibrillation: the multicentre AF-ED trial.

ABSTRACT: OBJECTIVES:The primary objective of this study was to ascertain the reasons for emergency department (ED) attendance among patients with a history of atrial fibrillation (AF). DESIGN:Appropriate ED attendance was defined by the requirement for an electrical or chemical cardioversion and/or an attendance resulting in hospitalisation or administration of intravenous medications for ventricular rate control. Quantitative and qualitative responses were recorded and analysed using descriptive statistics and content analysis, respectively. Random effects logistic regression was performed to estimate the OR of inappropriate ED attendance based on clinically relevant patient characteristics. PARTICIPANTS:Participants ?18 years with a documented history of AF were approached in one of eight centres partaking in the study across Canada (Ontario, Nova Scotia, Alberta and British Columbia). RESULTS:Of the 356 patients enrolled (67±13, 45% female), the majority (271/356, 76%) had inappropriate reasons for presentation and did not require urgent ED treatment. Approximately 50% of patients(172/356, 48%) were driven to the ED due to symptoms, while the remainder presented on the basis of general fear or anxiety (67/356, 19%) or prior medical advice (117/356, 33%). Random effects logistic regression analysis showed that patients with a history of congestive heart failure were significantly more likely to seek urgent care for appropriate reasons (p=0.03). Likewise, symptom-related concerns for ED presentation were significantly less likely to result in inappropriate visitation (p=0.02). When patients were surveyed on alternatives to ED care, the highest proportion of responses among both groups was in favour of specialised rapid assessment outpatient clinics (186/356, 52%). Qualitative content analysis confirmed these results. CONCLUSIONS:Improved education focused on symptom management and alleviating disease-related anxiety as well as the institution of rapid access arrhythmias clinics may reduce the need for unnecessary healthcare utilisation in the ED and subsequent hospitalisation. TRIAL REGISTRATION NUMBER:NCT03127085.

SUBMITTER: Hong KL

PROVIDER: S-EPMC7201301 | biostudies-literature | 2020 Apr

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

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Canada-wide mixed methods analysis evaluating the reasons for inappropriate emergency department presentation in patients with a history of atrial fibrillation: the multicentre AF-ED trial.

Hong Kathryn Lauren KL Babiolakis Corinne C Zile Brigita B Bullen Milena M Haseeb Sohaib S Halperin Frank F Hohl Corinne M CM Magee Kirk K Sandhu Roopinder K RK Tian Simon Yu SY Kennedy Ashley A Lobban Trudie T Mariano Zana Z Dorian Paul P Angaran Paul P Evans Marilyn M Leong-Sit Peter P Glover Benedict M BM

BMJ open 20200416 4

<h4>Objectives</h4>The primary objective of this study was to ascertain the reasons for emergency department (ED) attendance among patients with a history of atrial fibrillation (AF).<h4>Design</h4>Appropriate ED attendance was defined by the requirement for an electrical or chemical cardioversion and/or an attendance resulting in hospitalisation or administration of intravenous medications for ventricular rate control. Quantitative and qualitative responses were recorded and analysed using desc ...[more]

PMID: 32303514

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Project description:AimsThis multicentre, randomized trial compared three strategies of AF ablation: ablation of complex fractionated electrograms (CFE) alone, pulmonary vein isolation (PVI) alone, and combined PVI + CFE ablation, using standardized automated mapping software.Methods and resultsPatients with drug-refractory, high-burden paroxysmal (episodes >6 h, >4 in 6 months) or persistent atrial fibrillation (AF) were enrolled at eight centres. Patients (n = 100) were randomized to one of three arms. For CFE alone (n = 34), spontaneous/induced AF was mapped using validated, automated CFE software and all sites <120 ms were ablated until AF termination/non-inducibility. For PVI (n = 32), all four PV antra were isolated and confirmed using a circular catheter. For PVI + CFE (n = 34), all four PV antra were isolated, followed by AF induction and ablation of all CFE sites until AF termination/non-inducibility. Patients were followed at 3, 6, and 12 months with a visit, ECG, 48 h Holter. Atrial fibrillation symptoms were confirmed by loop recording. Repeat procedures were allowed within the first 6 months. The primary endpoint was freedom from AF >30 s at 1 year. Patients (age 57 +/- 10 years, LA size 42 +/- 6 mm) were 35% persistent AF. In CFE, ablation terminated AF in 68%. Only 0.4 PVs per patient were isolated as a result of CFE. In PVI, 94% had all four PVs successfully isolated. In PVI + CFE, 94% had all four PVs isolated, 76% had inducible AF with additional CFE ablation, with 73% termination of AF. There were significantly more repeat procedures in the CFE arm (47%) vs. PVI (31%) or PVI + CFE (15%) (P = 0.01). After one procedure, PVI + CFE had a significantly higher freedom from AF (74%) compared with PVI (48%) and CFE (29%) (P = 0.004). After two procedures, PVI + CFE still had the highest success (88%) compared with PVI (68%) and CFE (38%) (P = 0.001). Ninety-six percent of these patients were off anti-arrhythmics. Complications were two tamponades, no PV stenosis, and no mortality.ConclusionIn high-burden paroxysmal/persistent AF, PVI + CFE has the highest freedom from AF vs. PVI or CFE alone after one or two procedures. Complex fractionated electrogram alone has the lowest one and two procedure success rates with a higher incidence of repeat procedures. ClinicalTrials.gov identifier number NCT00367757.

Project description:ObjectiveConsultations occur frequently in the emergency department (ED) of tertiary care centres and pose a threat for patient safety as they contribute to ED lengths of stay (LOS) and overcrowding. The aim of this study was to investigate reasons and appropriateness of consultations, and the relative impact of specialty and patient characteristics on the probability of a consultation, because this could help to improve efficiency of ED patient care.MethodsThis prospective cohort study included ED patients presenting to a Dutch tertiary care centre in a setting where ED physicians mostly treat self-referred and undifferentiated patients and other specialists treat referred patients. Consultations were defined as appropriate if the reason of consultation corresponded with the final advice, conclusion or policy of the consulted specialty. Multivariable logistic regression analysis was used to assess the relative contribution of specialty and patient characteristics on consultation.ResultsIn the 344 (24% (95% CI 22 to 26%)) of the 1434 inclusions another specialty was consulted, resulting in a 55% increase of ED LOS. ED physicians more often consulted another specialty with a corrected odds ratio (OR) of 5.6 (4.0 to 7.8), mostly because consultations were mandatory in case of hospitalization or outpatient follow-up. Limited expertise of ED physicians was the reason for consultation in 7% (5 to 9%). The appropriateness of consultations was 84% (81 to 88%), similar between ED physicians and other specialists (P = 0.949). The patient characteristics age, comorbidity, and triage category and complaint predicted consultation.ConclusionIn a Dutch tertiary care centre another specialty was consulted in 24% of the patients, mostly for an appropriate reason, and rarely because of lack of expertise. The impact of consultations on ED LOS could be reduced if mandatory consultations are abolished and predictors of a consultation are used to facilitate timely consultation.

Project description:ObjectivesHospitalisation is frequently used as a marker of disease severity in observational Emergency Department (ED) studies. The comparison of ED admission rates is complex in potentially being influenced by the characteristics of the region, ED, physician and patient. We aimed to study variation in ED admission rates of febrile children, to assess whether variation could be explained by disease severity and to identify patient groups with large variation, in order to use this to reduce unnecessary health care utilization that is often due to practice variation.DesignMOFICHE (Management and Outcome of Fever in children in Europe, part of the PERFORM study, www.perform2020.org), is a prospective cohort study using routinely collected data on febrile children regarding patient characteristics (age, referral, vital signs and clinical alarming signs), diagnostic tests, therapy, diagnosis and hospital admission.Setting and participantsData were collected on febrile children aged 0-18 years presenting to 12 European EDs (2017-2018).Main outcome measuresWe compared admission rates between EDs by using standardised admission rates after adjusting for patient characteristics and initiated tests at the ED, where standardised rates >1 demonstrate higher admission rates than expected and rates <1 indicate lower rates than expected based on the ED patient population.ResultsWe included 38,120 children. Of those, 9.695 (25.4%) were admitted to a general ward (range EDs 5.1-54.5%). Adjusted standardised admission rates ranged between 0.6 and 1.5. The largest variation was seen in short admission rates (0.1-5.0), PICU admission rates (0.2-2.2), upper respiratory tract infections (0.4-1.7) and fever without focus (0.5-2.7). Variation was small in sepsis/meningitis (0.9-1.1).ConclusionsLarge variation exists in admission rates of febrile children evaluated at European EDs, however, this variation is largely reduced after correcting for patient characteristics and therefore overall admission rates seem to adequately reflect disease severity or a potential for a severe disease course. However, for certain patient groups variation remains high even after adjusting for patient characteristics.

Project description:STUDY OBJECTIVE:In the United States, nearly 70% of emergency department (ED) visits for atrial fibrillation result in hospitalization. The incidence of serious 30-day adverse events after an ED evaluation for atrial fibrillation remains low. This study's goal was to prospectively validate our previously reported Risk Estimator Decision Aid for Atrial Fibrillation (RED-AF) model for estimating a patient's risk of experiencing a 30-day adverse event. METHODS:This was a prospective cohort study, which enrolled a convenience sample of ED patients presenting with atrial fibrillation. RED-AF, previously derived from a retrospective cohort of 832 patients, assigns points according to age, sex, coexisting disease (eg, heart failure, hypertension, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease), smoking, home medications (eg, ?-blocker, diuretic), physical examination findings (eg, dyspnea, palpitations, peripheral edema), and adequacy of ED ventricular rate control. Primary outcome was occurrence of greater than or equal to 1 atrial fibrillation-related adverse outcome (ED visits, rehospitalization, cardiovascular complications, death) within 30 days. We identified a clinically relevant threshold and measured RED-AF's performance in this prospective cohort, assessing its calibration, discrimination, and diagnostic accuracy. RESULTS:The study enrolled 497 patients between June 2010 and February 2013. Of these, 120 (24%) had greater than or equal to 1 adverse event within 30 days. A RED-AF score of 87 was identified as an optimal threshold, resulting in sensitivity and specificity of 96% (95% confidence interval [CI] 91% to 98%) and 19% (95% CI 15% to 23%), respectively. Positive and negative predictive values were 27% (95% CI 23% to 32%) and 93% (95% CI 85% to 97%), respectively. The c statistic for RED-AF was 0.65 (95% CI 0.59 to 0.71). CONCLUSION:In this separate validation cohort, RED-AF performed moderately well and similar to the original derivation cohort for identifying the risk of short-term atrial fibrillation-related adverse events in ED patients receiving a diagnosis of atrial fibrillation.

Project description:ObjectiveTo determine the effect of gender on clinical outcomes of Asian non-valvular atrial fibrillation patients.DesignThis is a cohort study.Setting27 university and regional hospitals in Thailand.ParticipantsPatients with non-valvular atrial fibrillation.Primary and secondary outcomes measuresThe clinical outcomes were ischaemic stroke/transient ischaemic attack (TIA), major bleeding, intracerebral haemorrhage (ICH), heart failure and death. Follow-up data were recorded every 6 months until 3 years. Differences in clinical outcomes between males and females were determined. Multivariate analysis was performed to assess the effect of gender on clinical outcomes. Survival analysis and log-rank test were performed to determine the time-dependent effect of clinical outcomes, and the difference between males and females. Effect of oral anticoagulant (OAC) on outcomes and net clinical benefit of OAC was assessed. The analysis was performed both for the whole dataset and propensity score matching with multiple imputation.ResultsA total of 3402 patients (mean age: 67.4±11.3 years; 58.2% male) were included. Average follow-up duration 25.7±10.6 months (7192.6 persons-year). Rate of ischaemic stroke/TIA, major bleeding, ICH, heart failure and death were 1.43 (1.17-1.74), 2.11 (1.79-2.48), 0.70 (0.52-0.92), 3.03 (2.64-3.46) and 3.77 (3.33-4.25) per 100 person-years. Females had increased risk for ischaemic stroke/TIA and heart failure and males had increased risk for major bleeding and ICH. Ischaemic stroke/TIA risk in females and major bleeding and ICH risk in males remained even after correction for age, comorbid conditions and anticoagulation treatment. OAC reduced the risk of ischaemic stroke/TIA in males and females, and markedly increased the risk of major bleeding and ICH in males.ConclusionsFemales had a higher risk of ischaemic stroke/TIA and heart failure, and a lower risk of major bleeding and ICH compared with males. OAC reduced risk of ischaemic stroke/TIA in females, and markedly increased risk of major bleeding and ICH in males.

Dataset Information

Canada-wide mixed methods analysis evaluating the reasons for inappropriate emergency department presentation in patients with a history of atrial fibrillation: the multicentre AF-ED trial.

Publications

Canada-wide mixed methods analysis evaluating the reasons for inappropriate emergency department presentation in patients with a history of atrial fibrillation: the multicentre AF-ED trial.

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