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Primary Prevention with Statins: Strategies to Support Shared Decision-Making

  • Novel and Emerging Risk Factors (K. Nasir, Section Editor)
  • Published:
Current Cardiovascular Risk Reports Aims and scope Submit manuscript

Abstract

Purpose of Review

This paper proposes several strategies for health systems, primary care clinicians, cardiologists, and other members of the healthcare team to better engage individuals in decisions around primary preventive statin therapy.

Recent Findings

The 2013 American College of Cardiology and American Heart Association (ACC/AHA) guidelines for cholesterol management provide an opportunity to better engage patients in decisions about primary prevention of cardiovascular disease, including the initiation of statin therapy.

Summary

In the shared decision making process, clinicians and patients work together to determine what is best for the patient, taking into account the scientific evidence informing guideline recommendations, the clinician’s knowledge and experience, the known burdens of taking a daily lifelong medication, and the patient’s preferences, values and goals. Several challenges exist to adopting shared decision making as a patient-centered model of care.

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Acknowledgements

Dr. Spatz is supported by grant K12HS023000 from the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality Patient-Centered Outcomes Research Institute (PCORI) Mentored Career Development Program.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Section of Cardiovascular Medicine, Center for Outcomes Research and Evaluation, Yale School of Medicine, Yale New Haven Health, One Church Street, Suite 200, New Haven, CT, 06510, USA

    Erica S. Spatz

  2. Department of Medicine, Knowledge and Evaluation Research Unit, Center for the Science of Healthcare Delivery, Mayo Clinic, Rochester, MN, USA

    Victor M. Montori

Authors
  1. Erica S. Spatz
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  2. Victor M. Montori
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Erica S. Spatz.

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Conflict of Interest

Dr. Spatz reports receiving support from the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services to develop and maintain performance measures used in public reporting programs, including a measure of informed consent document quality.

Dr. Montori participates in the international GRADE Working Group that develops methodological innovations and standards in guideline development. The KER UNIT, in which Dr. Montori works, contracts with nonprofit professional organizations and federal entities to conduct systematic reviews and offer methodological advice in support of their guideline development efforts.

Human and Animal Rights and Informed Consent

This article does not contain any studies with human or animal subjects performed by any of the authors.

Additional information

This article is part of the Topical Collection on Novel and Emerging Risk Factors

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Spatz, E.S., Montori, V.M. Primary Prevention with Statins: Strategies to Support Shared Decision-Making. Curr Cardiovasc Risk Rep 11, 29 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12170-017-0556-3

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s12170-017-0556-3

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