Diagnosis and treatment optimisation is often delayed in people with heart failure and it can feel challenging to manage in routine general practice. Whilst there are 600,000 people in the UK living with heart failure, the numbers of patients with heart failure are relatively small per practice and therefore stratification search tools are of limited value.
UCLPartners Proactive Care Framework for Heart Failure has been developed to support primary care teams to embed proactive management of patients into routine clinical practice. This includes:
- a systematic approach to prioritisation
- comprehensive review and optimisation
- a broad range of resources to support clinicians delivering care in the real world
- specific help for staff and patients with education, self-management and behaviour change.
Access the Heart Failure Framework.
Why focus on heart failure?
Heart failure is associated with significant mortality and morbidity. It is the most common cause of hospitalisation in people over 65: patients who are admitted with Heart Failure have an extended length of hospital stay and a 30% risk of readmission within three months.
Mortality and morbidity is significantly reduced with optimisation of ‘prognostic’ medication in people with heart failure with reduced ejection fraction, but currently these treatments are underused.
For more information about Heart Failure, please visit Heart failure – NHS (www.nhs.uk)