Peripheral arterial disease pathway released

A quality improvement framework for peripheral arterial disease has been published by the Vascular Society.

A Best Practice Clinical Care Pathway for Peripheral Arterial Disease responds to recommendations made in the vascular surgery GIRFT programme report in 2018.

Peripheral arterial disease (PAD) is common, affecting one in five people over the age of 60 in the UK, and carries both the risk of lower limb loss and the increased risk of death from heart attack and stroke.

More than 4,000 major lower limb amputations are performed each year in England for complications of PAD and, or, diabetes.

The vascular GIRFT visits found that the delivery of revascularisation in CLTI is inconsistent across the UK, in terms of service provision, length of hospital stays and patient outcomes.

GIRFT reported universally unacceptable pathway delays to revascularisation. Furthermore, supervised exercise for intermittent claudication cannot be accessed in many parts of the UK.

The document was developed in collaboration with key stakeholders. It describes the care pathways, workforce and facilities required to improve outcomes for patients with PAD.

The author state: “Implementation of this QIF aims to reduce unwanted variation in services for people with PAD. Key to achieving this aim is the development of evidence-based, multi-disciplinary care pathways that include timelines to access urgent care for CLTI.

“In some regions, reorganisation based upon the network model described in the VS’s Provision of Vascular Services documents will be needed.

“In all regions, vascular network leads will need to work with hospital trusts, clinical commissioning groups (CCGs), integrated care systems (ICSs) and other medical and healthcare specialties, especially the multidisciplinary diabetic foot care teams (MDFTs), across their network areas to implement this QIF.”

This QIF is aligned with the Vascular GIRFT recommendation that vascular networks develop processes to deliver urgent care.

To access the report, click here.