Using Facebook to communicate mammography messages to rural audiences.

Objective: The purpose of this scholarly project was to answer the following question: What is the highest level of engagement achieved with a mammography campaign on Facebook?

Design And Sample: An Idaho public health department implemented a tailored message mammography campaign on Facebook during Breast Cancer Awareness Month. Target sample for the Facebook campaign were women and men over the age of 40 in rural Idaho.

Measures: Data collected from Facebook were used to measure and stratify engagement into a hierarchy of six levels, with intent to get a mammogram representing the highest level of engagement.

Implementation of a follow-up telephone call process for patients at high risk for readmission.

This project included the development and implementation of a follow-up telephone call within 72 hours of discharge, targeting patients at high risk for readmission. The goal was to improve understanding of aftercare instructions and decrease readmissions. Clinical nurse leaders provided an intervention in 66% of patient contacts.

Pilot Results of the Early Detection by Ultrasound of Carotid Artery Intima-Media Thickness Evaluation (EDUCATE) study.

Background: Limitations of current models for risk stratification are known. Noninvasive imaging is being advocated as an adjunct to improve risk prediction; however, studies documenting outcomes are rare. Therefore, we aimed to evaluate the negative and positive predictive values of carotid atherosclerosis for future cardiovascular events.

Carotid ultrasound for risk clarification in young to middle-aged adults undergoing elective coronary angiography.

Background: An important aspect of risk prediction is the apparent difference between calculated risk and true risk. Current risk predictor models are not sensitive enough to identify many subjects at risk for future events or to prevent overuse of expensive tests. The aim of this study was to determine the usefulness of carotid ultrasound for risk stratification in subjects undergoing elective coronary angiography.

Improving outcomes in heart failure in the community: long-term survival benefit of a disease-management program.

Objectives: The purpose of our current study was to determine whether our disease-management model was associated with long-term survival benefits. A secondary objective was to determine whether program involvement was associated with medication maintenance and reduced hospitalization over time compared to usual care management of heart failure.

Design: A retrospective chart review was conducted in patients who had been hospitalized for congestive heart failure between April 1999 and March 31, 2000, and had been discharged from the hospital for follow-up in the Heart Failure Clinic vs usual care.

Using a systemwide care path to enhance compliance with guidelines for acute myocardial infarction.

Background: Several acute myocardial infarction (MI) guidelines and policy statements have been developed, but compliance rates are suboptimal. The cardiology section at Gundersen Lutheran Medical Center (La Crosse, Wisconsin) used a systemwide approach to enhance compliance with guidelines.

Methods And Results: Data were collected prospectively for a 4-year period (May 15, 1995-May 15, 1999) for all patients presenting with acute MI.

Preventing myocardial infarction in the young adult in the first place: how do the National Cholesterol Education Panel III guidelines perform?

Objectives: The purpose of this study was to investigate the utility of the new National Cholesterol Education Program (NCEP) III guidelines in a group of young adults.

Background: These guidelines have been hailed as an improvement in their potential to identify individuals at risk for coronary heart disease (CHD) complications. Compared with the NCEP II, the new guidelines will increase the number of patients who qualify for medical management.

Improving care for patients with chronic heart failure in the community: the importance of a disease management program.

Study Objective: Utilizing a comparison group of patients with congestive heart failure (CHF) discharged to their primary care physicians, we sought to determine if disease management in a short-term, aggressive-intervention heart failure clinic (HFC) following hospital discharge is associated with improved outcomes.

Design: Chart review.

Setting: An integrated health-care center serving a tristate area.