EM Magazine - Acc 2016 Conference Cover - Apr 07, 2016 By Megan Daily
Can “Chest Pain Choice” an informative chart designed to guide emergency patients in making treatment decisions make a difference in care, patient anxiety, and costs? Erik Hess, MD and colleagues at Minnesota’s Mayo Clinic say it can.
That includes seeing more patients declining to have stress tests in the ED because they decide their risk of a cardiac event is low.
Results of a trial of this low tech, low-cost addition to emergency treatment of chest pain, were presented to the American College of Cardiology’s 65th Scientific Session and Expo in Chicago April 3.
The study was called Involving Patients with Low Risk Chest Pain in Discharge Decisions: A Multicenter Trial.
Using “Chest Pain Choice”, a one-page 11x17, color printed handout designed to be a decision aid to facilitate a doctor/patient discussion, Hess and his colleagues sought to gauge the effectiveness of the chart in achieving patient buy-in. They wanted to test the chart both as a tool for patient education and as a way to safely eliminate unnecessary testing and procedures.
The Mayo Clinic risk calculators for download here