RT Journal Article
SR Electronic
T1 See You in 7: improving acute myocardial infarction follow-up care
JF BMJ Open Quality
JO BMJ Open Qual
FD British Medical Journal Publishing Group
SP e000296
DO 10.1136/bmjoq-2017-000296
VO 7
IS 2
A1 Alex Batten
A1 Cassie Jaeger
A1 David Griffen
A1 Paula Harwood
A1 Karen Baur
YR 2018
UL http://bmjopenquality.bmj.com/content/7/2/e000296.abstract
AB Acute myocardial infarction (AMI) follow-up care is a crucial part of the AMI recovery process. The American College of Cardiology’s ‘See You in 7 Challenge’ advocates that all patients discharged with a diagnosis of AMI have a cardiac rehabilitation referral made and outpatient cardiac rehabilitation appointment scheduled to occur within 7 days of hospital discharge. A streamlined AMI cardiac rehabilitation referral and appointment scheduling process was not in place at this urban academic medical centre. To develop the streamlined processes, a Six Sigma project was initiated. Four months before the intervention, 1/38 patients with AMI (2.6%) were scheduled to have the initial outpatient cardiac rehabilitation appointment occur within 7 days of hospital discharge, with an average 18.7 days from hospital discharge to the scheduled initial outpatient cardiac rehabilitation appointment. To reduce the time to this initial appointment, availability of outpatient cardiac rehabilitation appointments was increased, additional staff were trained in appointment scheduling and insurance verification processes and appointments were scheduled prior to hospital discharge. After intervention, the number of patients scheduled to attend an outpatient cardiac rehabilitation appointment within 7 days of hospital discharge improved to 72/79 (91.1%) (two-proportion test, p<0.001). Days from hospital discharge to first scheduled outpatient cardiac rehabilitation appointment were reduced from 18.7 days to 6.3 days (a 66.3% reduction) (Mann-Whitney U test, p<0.01). Initial outpatient cardiac rehabilitation attendance within 7 days of hospital discharge increased from 1/38 (2.6%) to 42/79 (53.2%) (a 50.6% increase) (two-proportion test, p<0.001).