SUPPORT‐AF: Piloting a Multi‐Faceted, Electronic Medical Record‐Based Intervention to Improve Prescription of Anticoagulation

Abstract

Background Only 50% of eligible atrial fibrillation (AF) patients receive anticoagulation (AC). Feasibility and effectiveness of electronic medical record (EMR)–based interventions to profile and raise provider AC percentage is poorly understood. The SUPPORT‐AF (Supporting Use of AC Through Provider Profiling of Oral AC Therapy for AF) study aims to improve rates of adherence to AC guidelines by developing and delivering supportive tools based on the EMR to providers treating patients with AF. Methods and Results We emailed cardiologists and community‐based primary care providers affiliated with our institution reports of their AC percentage relative to peers. We also sent an electronic medical record–based message to these providers the day before an appointment with an atrial fibrillation patient who was eligible but not receiving AC. The electronic medical record message asked the provider to discuss AC with the patient if he or she deemed it appropriate. To assess feasibility, we tracked provider review of our correspondence. We also tracked the change in AC for intervention providers relative to alternate primary care providers not receiving our intervention. We identified 3786, 1054, and 566 patients cared for by 49 cardiology providers, 90 community‐based primary care providers, and 88 control providers, respectively. At baseline, the percentage of AC was 71.3%, 63.5%, and 58.3% for these 3 respective groups. Intervention providers reviewed our e‐mails and electronic medical record messages 45% and 96% of the time, respectively. For providers responding, patient refusal was the most common reason for patients not being on AC (21%) followed by high bleeding risk (19%). At follow‐up 10 weeks later, change in AC was no different for either cardiology or community‐based primary care providers relative to controls (0.2% lower and 0.01% higher, respectively). Conclusions Our intervention profiling AC was feasible, but not sufficient to increase AC in our population.

Keywords

• anticoagulation
• atrial fibrillation
• electronic medical record