The team at Central Pottsville Medical Centre recently took on a quality improvement activity to improve identification of patients at risk of cardiovascular disease.
With two new nurses starting at the practice and one with a background of working on the cardiac and stroke ward, it was decided as a team to do a quality improvement (QI) activity on cardiovascular disease (CVD) and stroke awareness and prevention.
All the team were engaged and on board with the activity and the clinical team decided on the criteria and demographics they would use to identify patients as being at risk.
The National Stroke Foundation was contacted and sent education resources that were put up around the practice and given to patients.
Searches for at-risk patients were done using Best Practice clinical software, and SMS messages were sent to identified patients to invite them in for an assessment. Nurses also searched through upcoming appointments to identify patients who may be at risk and offered an assessment.
One of their patients who had recently had a stroke was willing to share his patient journey to assist others in realising how important early intervention is. This was written up and put into patient packs along with the other patient resources from the National Stroke Foundation.
The nurses said how powerful it was to have someone from their local community share their story.
The team said this has already made a big impact on patients, and they have already referred some patients on for specialised cardiology assessments.
Another key impact is the increased confidence among the team in getting to know each other’s skill sets and learning from one another. They all feel they have increased their skills in cardiology and are much more confident in assessing and detecting risks in patients and getting a better picture of the whole patient.
Well done to the team at Central Pottsville Medical Centre.
To get started on a similar QI activity at your practice, see the Primary Care Impact QI activity Improve recording of risk factors to enable CVD assessment, where you will also be able to view the QI activity written up by the Central Pottsville Medical Centre team.