WESTCOP: a disease management approach to coronary artery disease.
Disease management is a systematic approach to improving care of populations of patients with specific clinical conditions. Critical to success are the formation of collaborative teams of health care stakeholders, development and promulgation of clinical practice guidelines, and performance measurement and feedback to providers as a process of continuous practice improvement. This article describes a disease management program for patients with coronary artery disease in a provincial health district with a population of 180,000. It discusses the rationale and methods behind the operationalisation of the main program elements, benefits achieved to date and challenges confronted.
Scott
I
I
Princess Alexandra Hospital, Brisbane.
Harper
C
C
Clough
A
A
West
M
M
D000208:Acute Disease; D003327:Coronary Disease / Q000628:therapy*; D003625:Data Collection; D019468:Disease Management; D006780:Hospitals, Rural / Q000458:organization & administration* / Q000592:standards; D006801:Humans; D010043:Outcome and Process Assessment, Health Care / Q000379:methods*; D010348:Patient Care Team; D017410:Practice Guidelines as Topic; D015397:Program Evaluation; D019984:Quality Indicators, Health Care; D011793:Queensland; D019035:Rural Health Services / Q000458:organization & administration* / Q000592:standards; D017749:Total Quality Management