Skip Navigation


European Heart Journal Advance Access originally published online on January 9, 2006
European Heart Journal 2006 27(6):737-745; doi:10.1093/eurheartj/ehi718
This Article
Right arrow Full Text Freely available
Right arrow FREE Full Text (PDF) Freely available
Right arrow All Versions of this Article:
27/6/737    most recent
ehi718v1
Right arrow E-letters: Submit a response
Right arrow Alert me when this article is cited
Right arrow Alert me when E-letters are posted
Right arrow Alert me if a correction is posted
Services
Right arrow Email this article to a friend
Right arrow Similar articles in this journal
Right arrow Similar articles in ISI Web of Science
Right arrow Similar articles in PubMed
Right arrow Alert me to new issues of the journal
Right arrow Add to My Personal Archive
Right arrow Download to citation manager
Right arrow Search for citing articles in:
ISI Web of Science (5)
Right arrowRequest Permissions
Right arrow Disclaimer
Google Scholar
Right arrow Articles by Engelfriet, P.
Right arrow Articles by Mulder, B.
Right arrow Search for Related Content
PubMed
Right arrow PubMed Citation
Right arrow Articles by Engelfriet, P.
Right arrow Articles by Mulder, B.
Social Bookmarking
Add to CiteULike   Add to Connotea   Add to Del.icio.us  
What's this?

© The European Society of Cardiology 2006. All rights reserved. For Permissions, please e-mail: journals.permissions@oxfordjournals.org

Adherence to guidelines in the clinical care for adults with congenital heart disease: The Euro Heart Survey on Adult Congenital Heart Disease

Peter Engelfriet1, Jan Tijssen1, Harald Kaemmerer2, Michael A. Gatzoulis3,4, Eric Boersma5, Erwin Oechslin6, Erik Thaulow7, Jana Popelová8, Philip Moons9, Folkert Meijboom5, Luciano Daliento10, Rafael Hirsch11, Valérie Laforest12, Ulf Thilén13 and Barbara Mulder1,*

1Department of Cardiology, Room B2-240, Academic Medical Centre, Meibergdreef 9, 1105 AZ Amsterdam, The Netherlands
2Department of Paediatric Cardiology and Congenital Heart Disease, Deutsches Herzcentrum, Munich, Germany
3National Heart and Lung Institute, Imperial College, London, UK
4Adult Congenital Heart Centre, Royal Brompton Hospital, London, UK
5Thoraxcenter, ErasmusMC, Rotterdam, The Netherlands
6CardioVascular Center, Division of Cardiology, University Hospital Zurich, Switzerland
7Department of Cardiology, Rikshospitalet, Oslo, Norway
8Department of Cardiac Surgery, Hospital Na Homolce, Prague, Czech Republic
9Centre for Health Services and Nursing Research, Katholieke Universiteit Leuven, Leuven, Belgium
10Department of Clinical and Experimental Medicine, University of Padua, Padua, Italy
11Department of Cardiology, Rabin Medical Center, Petah Tikva, Israel
12Euro Heart House, Sophia-Antipolis, France
13Department of Cardiology, University Hospital, Lund, Sweden

Received 24 June 2005; revised 26 October 2005; accepted 8 December 2005; online publish-ahead-of-print 9 January 2006.

* Corresponding author. Tel: +31 20 5662193; fax: +31 20 5666809. E-mail address: b.j.mulder{at}amc.uva.nl

This paper was guest edited by Prof. Fernando Maymone-Martins, Hospital de Santa Cruz, Portugal

Aims To investigate the role of guidelines in structuring the clinical care for adult patients with congenital heart disease (CHD), and to assess adherence to the guidelines in Europe.

Methods and results A selected number of current guidelines were chosen pertaining to operative procedures, investigations, and the use of medication (‘interventions’). The source for this analysis was the database of the Euro Heart Survey on adult CHD, which contains retrospectively collected data on 4110 patients followed-up for a median of 5.1 years. For each guideline investigated, patients were selected from the database for whom the particular guideline was relevant. The selected cases were classified according to two criteria: was there an indication for the particular intervention and did the intervention take place? In this manner, cases of ‘undue treatment’ and ‘insufficient treatment’ were identified. Adherence to guidelines was found to be good in the case of operative procedures and prophylactic drug treatment. However, regarding diagnostic procedures there had been adherence to guidelines in only slightly more than half of the cases.

Conclusion Guidelines have an important role in the actual clinical care of adults with CHD. However, large outcome studies are needed to develop more precise guidelines.

Key Words: Congenital heart disease • Adult • Adherence to guidelines • Euro Heart Survey


Add to CiteULike CiteULike   Add to Connotea Connotea   Add to Del.icio.us Del.icio.us    What's this?


This article has been cited by other articles:


Home page
 HeartHome page
P. M Engelfriet, M. G J Duffels, T. Moller, E. Boersma, J. G P Tijssen, E. Thaulow, M. A Gatzoulis, and B. J M Mulder
Pulmonary arterial hypertension in adults born with a heart septal defect: the Euro Heart Survey on adult congenital heart disease
Heart, June 1, 2007; 93(6): 682 - 687.
[Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]

Home page
 Eur Heart JHome page
P. Moons, P. Engelfriet, H. Kaemmerer, F. J. Meijboom, E. Oechslin, B. J.M. Mulder, and on behalf of the Expert Committee of Euro Heart Su
Delivery of care for adult patients with congenital heart disease in Europe: results from the Euro Heart Survey
Eur. Heart J., June 1, 2006; 27(11): 1324 - 1330.
[Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]


Disclaimer: Please note that abstracts for content published before 1996 were created through digital scanning and may therefore not exactly replicate the text of the original print issues. All efforts have been made to ensure accuracy, but the Publisher will not be held responsible for any remaining inaccuracies. If you require any further clarification, please contact our Customer Services Department.