Internal medicine journal
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Internal medicine journal · Aug 2021
ReviewTemporal Trends in the Burden of Heart Failure: a literature review.
Heart failure is a common healthcare problem associated with high morbidity and mortality. The burden of heart failure is changing; increases secondary to an ageing population may be offset by improved primary cardiovascular prevention and advances in heart failure therapies. ⋯ Despite improvements in therapies for heart failure, prognosis still remains poor with up to one-third of patients not surviving beyond 1 year following diagnosis and no improvements in mortality over the past 10 years. The case-mix of heart failure patients is changing with a greater proportion having non-ischaemic aetiology and preserved ejection fraction, and a higher prevalence of non-cardiovascular comorbidity and mortality.
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Internal medicine journal · Aug 2021
Impact of Victoria's first dedicated Endocrine Hypertension Service on the pattern of primary aldosteronism diagnoses.
Primary aldosteronism (PA) accounts for 3.2-12.7% of hypertension in primary care but is often diagnosed late, if at all. A delayed or missed diagnosis leads to poor blood pressure control and greater cardiovascular risk. ⋯ The EHS, with its strong component of general practitioner engagement, led to increased primary care referrals and PA detection earlier in the course of hypertension. Referred patients were on fewer antihypertensives and had less end-organ damage which simplified the diagnostic process, allowing targeted treatment to be commenced earlier and patient outcomes optimised.
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Internal medicine journal · Aug 2021
The impact of an online adult headache guideline on headache referrals to neurology clinic.
Headache is a common problem in primary care and one of the main reasons general practitioners (GP) consult the neurology service. We developed an online adult headache guideline (Supporting Information Appendix S1) for the greater Wellington Region as a resource for GP to guide identification of concerning headaches, initiation of prophylactic medications for migraine and management of analgesic overuse headache. ⋯ The launch of an online headache guideline was associated with a reduction in demand on neurology service. Further education could improve the utilisation of this guideline, to avoid delays in prophylactic treatment and reduce the harm of medication overuse.
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Internal medicine journal · Aug 2021
Letter Case ReportsSARS-CoV-2 infection in autologous stem cell transplantation.