Price Transparency in Radiology-A Model for the Future.

Medicine is the only business transaction in which consumers make important purchase decisions without knowing how much they have to pay. Lack of price transparency in health care imposes financial burden and anxiety among patients as the cost of health care has been shifting from employers to patients through high-deductible health plans (HDHPs). Health economists and policymakers anticipated that HDHPs with price transparency would be a catalyst for patients to "shop" for low-price providers, thus reducing overall health care spending.

Effect of Low-Intensity vs Standard-Intensity Warfarin Prophylaxis on Venous Thromboembolism or Death Among Patients Undergoing Hip or Knee Arthroplasty: A Randomized Clinical Trial.

Importance: The optimal international normalized ratio (INR) to prevent venous thromboembolism (VTE) in warfarin-treated patients with recent arthroplasty is unknown.

Objective: To determine the safety and efficacy of a target INR of 1.8 vs 2.

Effect of Genotype-Guided Warfarin Dosing on Clinical Events and Anticoagulation Control Among Patients Undergoing Hip or Knee Arthroplasty: The GIFT Randomized Clinical Trial.

Importance: Warfarin use accounts for more medication-related emergency department visits among older patients than any other drug. Whether genotype-guided warfarin dosing can prevent these adverse events is unknown.

Objective: To determine whether genotype-guided dosing improves the safety of warfarin initiation.

Implementation of a Value-Driven Outcomes Program to Identify High Variability in Clinical Costs and Outcomes and Association With Reduced Cost and Improved Quality.

Importance: Transformation of US health care from volume to value requires meaningful quantification of costs and outcomes at the level of individual patients.

Objective: To measure the association of a value-driven outcomes tool that allocates costs of care and quality measures to individual patient encounters with cost reduction and health outcome optimization.

Design, Setting, And Participants: Uncontrolled, pre-post, longitudinal, observational study measuring quality and outcomes relative to cost from 2012 to 2016 at University of Utah Health Care.

Platelet-Monocyte Aggregates and C-Reactive Protein are Associated with VTE in Older Surgical Patients.

Emerging evidence implicates platelets as key mediators of venous thromboembolism (VTE). Nevertheless, the pathways by which platelets and circulating procoagulant proteins synergistically orchestrate VTE remain incompletely understood. We prospectively determined whether activated platelets and systemic procoagulant factors were associated with VTE in 32 older orthopedic surgery patients.

VTE Incidence and Risk Factors in Patients With Severe Sepsis and Septic Shock.

Background: Prospective studies on the incidence of VTE during severe sepsis and septic shock remain absent, hindering efficacy assessments regarding VTE prevention strategies in sepsis.

Methods: We prospectively studied 113 consecutively enrolled patients in the ICU with severe sepsis and septic shock at three hospitals. All patients provided informed consent.

Value Driven Outcomes (VDO): a pragmatic, modular, and extensible software framework for understanding and improving health care costs and outcomes.

Objective: To develop expeditiously a pragmatic, modular, and extensible software framework for understanding and improving healthcare value (costs relative to outcomes).

Materials And Methods: In 2012, a multidisciplinary team was assembled by the leadership of the University of Utah Health Sciences Center and charged with rapidly developing a pragmatic and actionable analytics framework for understanding and enhancing healthcare value. Based on an analysis of relevant prior work, a value analytics framework known as Value Driven Outcomes (VDO) was developed using an agile methodology.

A pharmacogenetic versus a clinical algorithm for warfarin dosing.

Background: The clinical utility of genotype-guided (pharmacogenetically based) dosing of warfarin has been tested only in small clinical trials or observational studies, with equivocal results.

Methods: We randomly assigned 1015 patients to receive doses of warfarin during the first 5 days of therapy that were determined according to a dosing algorithm that included both clinical variables and genotype data or to one that included clinical variables only. All patients and clinicians were unaware of the dose of warfarin during the first 4 weeks of therapy.

(18)F-FDG PET in the evaluation of acuity of deep vein thrombosis.

Purpose: F-FDG PET has been used for vascular disease, but its role in deep vein thrombosis (DVT) remains prospectively unexplored.

Patients And Methods: Whole-body F-FDG PET/CT scans were performed in patients 1 to 10 weeks after onset of symptomatic DVT (n = 12) and in control subjects without DVT (n = 24). The metabolic activity (SUVmax) of thrombosed and contralateral nonthrombosed vein segments was determined.

Statins for the prevention of venous thromboembolism? a narrative review.

Venous thromboembolism (VTE), including deep vein thrombosis and pulmonary embolism, is a substantial public health problem. The majority of VTE events are associated with transient periods of heightened risk, such as prolonged hospitalization, undergoing major surgery, experiencing trauma or lower extremity immobility, use of oral contraceptives, or having active cancer. Although pharmacologic thromboprophylaxis agents (eg, unfractionated heparin, low-molecular-weight heparins, warfarin, and novel oral anticoagulants) are effective, they remain underused, with concerns about increased bleeding risk often cited as a reason.

Health benefits of gastric bypass surgery after 6 years.

Context: Extreme obesity is associated with health and cardiovascular disease risks. Although gastric bypass surgery induces rapid weight loss and ameliorates many of these risks in the short term, long-term outcomes are uncertain.

Objective: To examine the association of Roux-en-Y gastric bypass (RYGB) surgery with weight loss, diabetes mellitus, and other health risks 6 years after surgery.

Prospective pilot trial of PerMIT versus standard anticoagulation service management of patients initiating oral anticoagulation.

We performed a randomised pilot trial of PerMIT, a novel decision support tool for genotype-based warfarin initiation and maintenance dosing, to assess its efficacy for improving warfarin management. We prospectively studied 26 subjects to compare PerMIT-guided management with routine anticoagulation service management. CYP2C9 and VKORC1 genotype results for 13 subjects randomly assigned to the PerMIT arm were recorded within 24 hours of enrolment.

Prospective comparison of three enoxaparin dosing regimens to achieve target anti-factor Xa levels in hospitalized, medically ill patients with extreme obesity.

Enoxaparin is commonly used to prevent venous thromboembolism(VTE) [1,2] but has not been well-studied in patients with extreme obesity,a population at high risk for VTE. We prospectively compared three enoxaparin dosing regimens for the achievement of goal peak anti-Factor Xa levels in medically ill patients (n 5 31) with extreme obesity (body mass index (BMI) ‡ 40 kg/m2). Patients were assigned to receive fixed-dose (FD) enoxaparin 40 mg daily (QDay, n 5 11), weight based,lower-dose (LD) enoxaparin 0.

Pharmacogenetic warfarin dose refinements remain significantly influenced by genetic factors after one week of therapy.

By guiding initial warfarin dose, pharmacogenetic (PGx) algorithms may improve the safety of warfarin initiation. However, once international normalised ratio (INR) response is known, the contribution of PGx to dose refinements is uncertain. This study sought to develop and validate clinical and PGx dosing algorithms for warfarin dose refinement on days 6-11 after therapy initiation.

Current challenges in personalizing warfarin therapy.

In an exciting era where novel oral anticoagulants, such as the factor Xa and direct thrombin inhibitors, are beginning to emerge as therapeutic options, the vitamin K antagonists (VKAs) such as warfarin, which have been in clinical use for over half a century, will remain an important part of the therapeutic landscape for the foreseeable future. The optimal effectiveness and safety of the VKAs is limited by significant inter- and intra- patient variability in dose response. As such, routine laboratory monitoring with subsequent dose adjustment to achieve and maintain an international normalized ratio (INR) that falls within a narrow therapeutic range is necessary; even with frequent INR monitoring, time in therapeutic range of VKAs is generally <60% in usual care settings.

Hospital-based clinical implications of the novel oral anticoagulant, dabigatran etexilate, in daily practice.

Dabigatran etexilate is an oral direct thrombin inhibitor that has been approved by the US Food and Drug Administration for the prevention of stroke and systemic embolization in patients with nonvalvular atrial fibrillation. It has also been studied for the prevention of venous thromboembolism in patients after hip and knee arthroplasty and for treatment of venous thromboembolism. Although routine laboratory monitoring is not needed, there are clinical scenarios in which physicians will need to have a clear understanding of drug pharmacology, laboratory assessment, and reversibility of this drug to make appropriate clinical decisions.

A pilot study utilizing whole body 18 F-FDG-PET/CT as a comprehensive screening strategy for occult malignancy in patients with unprovoked venous thromboembolism.

Background: Approximately 7-10% of patients with unprovoked VTE will be diagnosed with cancer within 12 months. Although cancer screening has been proposed in these patients, the optimal strategy remains unclear. In a pilot study, we prospectively investigated the use of FDG-PET/CT to screen for occult malignancy in 40 patients with unprovoked VTE.

Hip fracture management for the hospital-based clinician: a review of the evidence and best practices.

Hip fracture is an unfortunate and common health problem in the elderly that is associated with a 1-year mortality of 10% to 35%. Further, only 50% of these patients regain their pre-fracture level of mobility and functional status. Hospital-based clinicians are increasingly asked to comanage these patients.

Favorable changes in cardiac geometry and function following gastric bypass surgery: 2-year follow-up in the Utah obesity study.

Objectives: The objective of this study was to test the hypothesis that gastric bypass surgery (GBS) would favorably impact cardiac remodeling and function.

Background: GBS is increasingly used to treat severe obesity, but there are limited outcome data.

Methods: We prospectively studied 423 severely obese patients undergoing GBS and a reference group of severely obese subjects that did not have surgery (n = 733).

Clinical characteristics, management, and outcomes of patients diagnosed with acute pulmonary embolism in the emergency department: initial report of EMPEROR (Multicenter Emergency Medicine Pulmonary Embolism in the Real World Registry).

Objectives: In a large U.S. sample, this study measured the presentation features, testing, treatment strategies, and outcomes of patients diagnosed with pulmonary embolism (PE) in the emergency department (ED).

Prevention of venous thromboembolism in obesity.

Venous thromboembolism (VTE) is a significant cause of morbidity and mortality in hospitalized patients. Where appropriate, evidence-based methods of prophylaxis are implemented and the burden of VTE can be reduced substantially. Obesity, including morbid obesity, is associated with a high risk of VTE and, unfortunately, fixed doses of US FDA-approved anticoagulant regimens, including unfractionated heparins, low-molecular-weight heparins and factor Xa inhibitors, may not provide optimal VTE prophylaxis in these patients.

Established venous thromboembolism therapies: heparin, low molecular weight heparins, and vitamin K antagonists, with a discussion of heparin-induced thrombocytopenia.

For a majority of patients with venous thromboembolism (VTE), initial treatment is straightforward and necessitates the immediate initiation of a parenteral anticoagulant (eg, heparin or low molecular weight heparin), simultaneous initiation of long-term therapy (eg, vitamin K antagonist), and discontinuation of the parenteral anticoagulant after 5 days assuming that the vitamin K antagonist is therapeutic. This standardized approach is based on numerous pivotal clinical trials completed over the past 3 decades. Yet, advances in standardized VTE treatment continue to evolve and include issues related to the selection and dosing of parenteral anticoagulants (eg, relative efficacy and dosing in the obese patient, patients with renal impairment, and pregnant patients), optimal location of initial care delivery, use of dosing initiation nomograms for vitamin K antagonists with the potential of gene-based dosing, and demonstration that longterm low molecular weight heparin therapy may be optimal for some patient populations (eg, those with active cancer).

Pulmonary embolism with unexpected echocardiogram findings.

A 56-year-old woman was evaluated for dyspnea in the emergency department. She had no risk factors for venous thromboembolism except hormone replacement therapy; however, pulmonary embolism was suspected and subsequently confirmed via computed tomographic angiogram. An echocardiogram was conducted to further assess right ventricular function, revealing marked right ventricular enlargement and a mobile mass in the left atrium (initially suspected to be an atrial myxoma).