Multidisciplinary Approach for High Risk Patients Leading to Early Diagnosis of Canadians in Heart Failure

Heart failure describes a chronic condition where the heart muscle is no longer able to supply the body with enough oxygen and nutrients. This can lead to fatigue and poor quality of life. Often, people do not know they have heart failure until they end up in hospital. This study wants to improve the screening of heart failure and identify patients at risk for heart failure earlier. This will help determine if early-screening and treatment can help prevent further decline in these patients. This is a randomized, un-blinded study comparing usual care to an intervention group receiving early heart failure testing. Pre-screening will be performed using extracted primary care electronic health records with the case finding algorithm based on the inclusion and exclusion criteria. An invitation letter will be send to prospective patients which include a registration telephone number and link to dedicated study website. The invitation for contact will adopt an "opt out" approach (ask the potential participant to contact the coordinating centre if they do not wish to be contacted). Potential participants not opting out, or opting in, within 2 weeks of invitation mailing will be sent a patient information package along with follow up contact by research team. Consented participants will be randomized either to usual care or interventions group and followed for six months. Intervention group will have NT-proBNP drawn and those with an elevated NT-proBNP (\>125pg/mL) will have a study visit with assessments to include, physical examination, electrocardiogram and study AI echocardiogram.