Collaboration between dyspnea clinic and primary care physicians to identify heart failure with preserved ejection fraction in the community: Results from the Maebashi City HF project.

Background: Despite increasing awareness in general practice, heart failure with preserved ejection fraction (HFpEF) remains under-diagnosed in the community due to diagnostic difficulties. Dedicated dyspnea clinics are responsible for diagnosing HFpEF and efficient referral from primary care physicians is the key to enhance its role.

Methods: This retrospective analysis was performed to assess the effectiveness of a one-year collaborative project between our dyspnea clinic and the Maebashi Medical Association. Primary care physicians were encouraged to screen patients at risk for HFpEF and refer them to the dyspnea clinic, where exercise stress echocardiography was utilized to enhance the identification of HFpEF. To evaluate the clinical value of the project, the data obtained were compared with data from the previous year without collaboration.

Results: The collaborative project was conducted between May 2023 and May 2024. The rate of patients referred from the city increased from 47 % during the previous year to 87 % during the collaborative period (p < 0.0001). Most of the patients were referred by non-cardiologists (77 %). The prevalence of HFpEF diagnosis tended to increase from 32 % to 39 % after the collaborative project, while pulmonary causes of dyspnea tended to decrease from 21 % to 12 %. After a thorough evaluation at the dyspnea clinic, 98 % of referred patients were referred back to their referring physicians for further treatment and follow-up.

Conclusions: These data suggest the effectiveness of our approach to identify HFpEF in the community through collaboration between the dedicated dyspnea clinic and primary care physicians.