on June 7, 2013 |
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Topics: Electrophysiology, Cardiovascular, Service Lines
Carly Anderson, Cardiovascular Roundtable
An article published in Circulation this week about the safety of ICDs in athletes raises a number of questions about the effects these devices can have on various patient populations.
For the registry-based study, researchers analyzed 372 athletes with ICDs who were between the ages of 10 and 60. Participants played either organized or high-risk sports, the most common being running, basketball, soccer, and skiing. Patients were followed for a median of 31 months, and electrophysiologists examined ICD shock and clinical outcomes data every 6 months.
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Play ball? Only 10% of athletes with ICDs received shocks while playing sports
on June 5, 2013 |
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Topics: Cardiovascular, Service Lines, Business Development, Strategy, Technology Assessment, Planning, Service Line Growth, Volume Growth
Brian Contos and Megan Tooley, Cardiovascular Roundtable
On behalf of the Cardiovascular Roundtable, we are excited to share early results from our analysis of transcatheter aortic valve replacement (TAVR) cases from the just-released Medicare claims data for the 2012 fiscal year (Oct. 1, 2011 – Sept. 30, 2012). To the best of our knowledge, ours is the first analysis of all U.S. TAVR procedures performed in the year following FDA approval.
These analyses address a number of questions we’ve received from members regarding the TAVR marketplace and experiences from early adopters, including volumes, patient characteristics, clinical outcomes, and reimbursement.
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New transcatheter valve benchmarks you won't find anywhere else
on May 31, 2013 |
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Topics: Collaborative Relationships, Physician Issues, Physician Engagement, Cardiovascular, Service Lines
Jeffrey Rakover, Cardiovascular Roundtable
Despite recent gains, physicians report applying clinical guidelines to only about half of their patients. A number of factors drive sub-optimal compliance. As the Roundtable pointed out in The New Economics of Quality, these include:
- Rapidly changing evidence-based guidelines, and guidelines’ complexity
- Fears of “cookbook” medicine and loss of autonomy
- Inadequate integration into workflows
As profiled in this month’s edition of Health Affairs, Boston Children’s Hospital addressed these challenges through care pathways that stress flexibility, evidence, and principled clinical variation.
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Embrace principled clinical variation to improve physician engagement
