Triage Practice Guideline for Patients Hospitalized with Congestive Heart Failure: Improving the Effectiveness of the Coronary Care Unit

Background: Decisions regarding the appropriate timing for transfer of patients hospitalized with congestive heart failure from the coronary care unit (CCU) to the medical ward are often not based on well-founded medical data. We investigated the potential safety and effectiveness of a practice guideline recommending early "step-down" transfer of low-risk patients with congestive heart failure.

Patients And Methods: We studied the use of a practice guideline for 384 patients hospitalized with congestive heart failure in a hypothetic experiment. The guideline stated that patients without any of the following conditions may be suitable for transfer to a nonmonitored bed 24 hours after admission: acute myocardial infarction or ischemia, complications, active or planned cardiac interventions, unstable comorbidity, worsening clinical status, or lack of response to diuretic therapy. Patients with any of the above conditions were classified as higher risk and potentially not suitable for early transfer.

Results: Life-threatening complications were 15.2 times more likely (95% confidence interval [CI] 2.2, 70, p = 0.001) and death 14.6 times more likely (95% CI 2.1, 68, p = 0.001) if the patient was classified as "high risk" rather than "low risk" by the guideline. The negative predictive value and sensitivity of the practice guideline for detecting patients who had life-threatening complications were 99.2% and 96.4%, respectively. Thirty-one percent of patients with congestive heart failure hospitalized in either the CCU or intermediate care unit were at low risk and potentially suitable for transfer to a nonmonitored bed 24 hours after admission. Use of the guideline would have reduced intermediate care unit lengths of stay from 2.91 days to 2.22 days and CCU length of stay from 2.06 to 2.04 days had it been used to triage patients with congestive heart failure. This reduction in length of stay would have resulted in 172 more intermediate care unit bed-days available per year to accommodate additional patients. On initial review, at least one cardiologist reviewer judged that use of the guideline may have adversely affected quality of care for 4% (95% CI 1%, 7%) of patients. After a consensus among the cardiologist reviewers, it was judged that the guideline may have adversely affected care for only 0.8% of patients (95% CI, 0%, 2.3%), and that no patient (95% CI 0%, 2.3%) would have had an unexpected life-threatening complication because of the guideline.

Conclusions: Use of a practice guideline has the potential to reduce the intermediate care unit lengths of stay for selected low-risk patients with congestive heart failure.