Improving Adherence to Guidelines for Acute Stroke Management

Improving adherence to guidelines for acute stroke management.

In recent years, many medical professional organizations such as the European Society of Cardiology, the American Heart Association, the American College of Cardiology, and the American Stroke Association have promoted guidelinebased therapy for different groups of patients. These guidelines are based in part on large clinical trials and, when such are not available, on so-called expert opinion.

Emergency department adherence to American Heart Association guidelines for blood pressure management in acute ischemic stroke.

BACKGROUND AND PURPOSE Severely elevated blood pressure (BP) and aggressive BP reduction are both associated with poor outcome in acute ischemic stroke (AIS). In nontissue-type plasminogen activator patients, the American Heart Association recommends antihypertensive therapy only if BP is ≥ 220/120 mm Hg with a goal of 15% to 25% reduction in the first 24 hours. We hypothesized that patients wi...

Improving adherence to heart failure management guidelines via abductive reasoning

Management of chronic diseases such as heart failure (HF) is a major public health problem. A standard approach to managing chronic diseases by medical community is to have a committee of experts develop guidelines that all physicians should follow. Due to their complexity, these guidelines are difficult to implement and are adopted slowly by the medical community at large. We have developed a ...

Clinical Guidelines for Acute Stroke Management

Adherence to guidelines for ESRD anemia management.

BACKGROUND A costly component of end-stage renal disease care is anemia management with recombinant human erythropoietin. National Kidney Foundation clinical practice guidelines recommend that erythropoietin be administered subcutaneously, rather than intravenously, given that the target hemoglobin level can be maintained with a lower subcutaneous dose. Because reimbursement for erythropoietin ...