Multidisciplinary Intervention Has No Significant Effect on Heart Failure Readmissions

A multidisciplinary educational approach to reduce 30-day heart failure readmissions at a hospital in Tucson, Arizona, failed to have a significant impact—although readmission rates for patients in both the intervention group and the control group were below national norms. Researchers published their findings in the Saudi Pharmaceutical Journal. 

The retrospective observational study included 221 patients who received inpatient care for heart failure and educational intervention. Intervention components included counseling by pharmacy students, heart failure education provided by a pharmacist and a nurse in a group class for patients and caregivers and/or one-on-one education provided by a nurse, and follow-up phone calls reinforcing heart failure education within 3 days of hospital discharge. The control group included another 183 patients admitted for heart failure. 

Among patients in the intervention group, just 5% received all intervention components. Researchers speculated that various factors may have contributed to the low percentage, such as limited availability of pharmacy students, inability of patients to attend the heart failure class during the times it was offered, and an inability to reach patients by phone after discharge.  

Some 44.8% of intervention patients received the pharmacy student counseling component, 47.1% received the heart failure education component, and 25.3% were reached by phone within 3 days of hospital discharge. 

The 30-day readmission rate for patients in the intervention group was 4.5%, the study found, compared with 3.8% in the control group. 

“It is worth noting that none of the 11 patients who received all components of the intervention were readmitted,” researchers reported. 

In addition to the overall intervention, none of the specific intervention components alone was associated with a significant reduction in 30-day readmissions, according to the study. 

“However, this study was underpowered to detect a difference,” researchers pointed out. “Another study, powered enough to detect a potential difference, is needed to assess the rate of heart failure readmission in patients receiving all components of the multidisciplinary intervention.” 

—Jolynn Tumolo 

Reference:

Aljabri A. An inpatient multidisciplinary educational approach to reduce 30-day heart failure readmissions. Saudi Pharm J. 2021;29(4):337-342. doi:10.1016/j.jsps.2021.03.008