Congratulations to neurologist Dr. Andrew Penn and the Island Health team who won Best Poster at the 31st Annual Centre for Health Services and Policy Research (CHSPR) Conference.
The entire team of Dr. Penn, Max Bibok, Kristine Votova, Marko Peljhan, Mark Blandford, Graham Payette, Sergio Duran and Ryan Vissers deserve congratulations.
View their winning poster here.
The team developed a decision-support tool to reduce unnecessary imaging and ensure timely treatment for patients at high-risk of stroke following a transient ischemic attack (TIA). The tool automatically generates decisions for diagnosis and corresponding best practice recommendations. It's currently used as a referral form to the Stroke Rapid Assessment Unit at Victoria General Hospital.
The tool was developed by engaging with medical staff from emergency medicine and neurology. Feasibility testing was recently conducted with Interior Health, which is actively implementing the tool into their acute stroke care strategy.
The tool was developed as part of the Genome SpecTRA project, funded by Genome BC and Genome Canada for $9.6 million dollars, and hosted at Island Health from 2013 – 2018.
What’s next?
Island Health is developing this innovative tool for mobile use and linkage with electronic health records, and engaging with the BC Emergency Medicine Network and Stroke Services BC. This will create a process to track TIA prevalence, outcomes, and usage of the tool in real-time.
There is significant value in rolling out the tool province-wide, so that regardless of location, best practice and care recommendations are consistent.
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