Necessity of hospitalization and stress testing in low risk chest pain patients

Characterizing pre-discharge interventions to reduce length of stay for older adults: A scoping review

BACKGROUND

Hospital pre-discharge interventions are becoming one of the leading strategies to promote early discharge. For older adult patients, it remains unclear what these interventions are and how they affect discharge outcomes.

OBJECTIVE

This scoping review categorizes pre-discharge interventions promoting early acute care hospital discharging or total hospital length of stay reductions among older adults, synthesizes contextual factors (e.g., cost, staffing) driving implementation, and assesses the perceived intervention's impact.

DESIGN

The review followed the five states of the Arksey and O'Malley framework and the PRISMA-ScR extension. The PubMed, Embase, and Scopus databases were searched from 1983 to 2020 for pre-discharge interventions designed or adapted to discharge older adults earlier in their stay from acute care hospitals. Potentially relevant articles were screened against eligibility criteria. Findings were extracted and collated in data charting forms followed by brief thematic analyses.

RESULTS

The search yielded 5,455 articles of which 91 articles were included. Eight pre-discharge intervention categories were identified: clinical management, diagnostic/risk assessment tools, staffing enhancements, drug administration, length of stay protocols, nutrition planning, and communication improvements. Leading motivations for intervention implementation included the nationwide drive to reduce care costs and hospitals' need to increase hospital profitability, improve quality of care, or optimize resource utilization. Discharge outcomes reported included hospitalization costs, readmission rates, mortality rates, resource utilization rates and costs, and length of stay. Mixed results were found regarding the effectiveness of early discharge interventions on discharge outcomes based on expressed author sentiment.

CONCLUSIONS

The drive for pre-discharge interventions that reduce older adult hospital stays and associated costs continues to stem primarily from economic and governmental policies. Follow-up studies may be required to emphasize patient perspectives and care trajectories to avoid unintentional costly and health-deteriorating consequences.

Noninvasive Cardiac Testing and Cardiovascular Outcomes for Low-Risk Chest Pain in the Emergency Department: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis

Background

With the widespread adoption of high-sensitivity troponin testing, recent guidelines no longer recommend urgent noninvasive cardiac testing for suspected cardiac disease in low-risk emergency department (ED) patients. We conducted a meta-analysis to determine whether urgent noninvasive testing, compared to no testing, is associated with improved cardiovascular outcomes in low-risk patients.

Methods

We searched databases for studies of adults evaluated in the ED for low-risk acute chest pain based on clinical criteria, diagnostic testing, or risk scores. Outcomes were all-cause death or myocardial infarction (MI), and revascularization alone, at 90 days and 1 year.

Results

A total of 1.5 million patients were included from 17 observational and 2 randomized studies. The overall rate of death or MI was 0.3% at 90 days, and 0.4% at 1 year. The odds of death or MI were not significantly different at 90 days (9 studies with 144,447 participants; odds ratio [OR] = 0.92 [0.48-1.76]) or 1 year (13 studies with 146,563 participants; OR = 0.92 [0.63-1.35]) between the tested and nontested groups. The odds of revascularization were significantly higher in tested groups at 90 days (12 studies with 513,862 participants; OR = 2.21 [1.17-4.17]) and 1 year (16 studies with 1,441,693 participants; OR = 2.61 [1.95-3.48]).

Conclusions

Noninvasive testing for low-risk chest pain in the ED was not associated with lower odds of death or MI, but it was associated with more than twice the odds of revascularization. This finding supports current guidelines recommending against universal noninvasive testing for ED patients with low-risk chest pain.

HEART Pathway Implementation Safely Reduces Hospitalizations at One Year in Patients With Acute Chest Pain

STUDY OBJECTIVE

We determine whether implementation of the HEART (History, ECG, Age, Risk Factors, Troponin) Pathway is safe and effective in emergency department (ED) patients with possible acute coronary syndrome through 1 year of follow-up.

METHODS

A preplanned analysis of 1-year follow-up data from a prospective pre-post study of 8,474 adult ED patients with possible acute coronary syndrome from 3 US sites was conducted. Patients included were aged 21 years or older, evaluated for possible acute coronary syndrome, and without ST-segment elevation myocardial infarction. Accrual occurred for 12 months before and after HEART Pathway implementation, from November 2013 to January 2016. The HEART Pathway was integrated into the electronic health record at each site as an interactive clinical decision support tool. After integration, ED providers prospectively used the HEART Pathway to identify patients with possible acute coronary syndrome as low risk (appropriate for early discharge without stress testing or angiography) or nonlow risk (appropriate for further inhospital evaluation). Safety (all-cause death and myocardial infarction) and effectiveness (hospitalization) at 1 year were determined from health records, insurance claims, and death index data.

RESULTS

Preimplementation and postimplementation cohorts included 3,713 and 4,761 patients, respectively. The HEART Pathway identified 30.7% of patients as low risk; 97.5% of them were free of death and myocardial infarction within 1 year. Hospitalization at 1 year was reduced by 7.0% in the postimplementation versus preimplementation cohort (62.1% versus 69.1%; adjusted odds ratio 0.70; 95% confidence interval 0.63 to 0.78). Rates of death or myocardial infarction at 1 year were similar (11.6% versus 12.4%; adjusted odds ratio 1.00; 95% confidence interval 0.87 to 1.16).

CONCLUSION

HEART Pathway implementation was associated with decreased hospitalizations and low adverse event rates among low-risk patients at 1-year follow-up.

The HEART Pathway Randomized Controlled Trial One-year Outcomes

OBJECTIVE

The objective was to determine the impact of the HEART Pathway on health care utilization and safety outcomes at 1 year in patients with acute chest pain.

METHODS

Adult emergency department (ED) patients with chest pain (N = 282) were randomized to the HEART Pathway or usual care. In the HEART Pathway arm, ED providers used the HEART score and troponin measures (0 and 3 hours) to risk stratify patients. Usual care was based on American College of Cardiology/American Heart Association guidelines. Major adverse cardiac events (MACE-cardiac death, myocardial infarction [MI], or coronary revascularization), objective testing (stress testing or coronary angiography), and cardiac hospitalizations and ED visits were assessed at 1 year. Randomization arm outcomes were compared using Fisher's exact tests.

RESULTS

A total of 282 patients were enrolled, with 141 randomized to each arm. MACE at 1 year occurred in 10.6% (30/282): 9.9% in the HEART Pathway arm (14/141; 10 MIs, four revascularizations without MI) versus 11.3% in usual care (16/141; one cardiac death, 13 MIs, two revascularizations without MI; p = 0.85). Among low-risk HEART Pathway patients, 0% (0/66) had MACE, with a negative predictive value (NPV) of 100% (95% confidence interval = 93%-100%). Objective testing through 1 year occurred in 63.1% (89/141) of HEART Pathway patients compared to 71.6% (101/141) in usual care (p = 0.16). Nonindex cardiac-related hospitalizations and ED visits occurred in 14.9% (21/141) and 21.3% (30/141) of patients in the HEART Pathway versus 10.6% (15/141) and 16.3% (23/141) in usual care (p = 0.37, p = 0.36).

CONCLUSIONS

The HEART Pathway had a 100% NPV for 1-year safety outcomes (MACE) without increasing downstream hospitalizations or ED visits. Reduction in 1-year objective testing was not significant.