Adherence to Hypercholesterolemia Management Guidelines By Health Care Providers in a United States Air Force Medical Treatment Facility

Abstract

Building a healthy community is the goal of Healthy People 2000 and Healthy People 2010, and is also one of the U.S. Air Force Medical Service priorities. Periodic cholesterol screening and lifestyle modification can prevent the suffering from coronary heart disease, save lives, minimize financial burden, and effectively utilize the limited resources. The purpose of this study was to describe the adherence to the National Cholesterol Education Program (NCEP) guidelines pertaining to cholesterol screening and the use of lifestyle modification management for treating high cholesterol in adults without evidence of coronary heart disease by health care providers in a United States Air Force medical treatment facility. The researcher conducted a retrospective medical record review using a checklist to describe health care providers' adherence to the NCEP guidelines on cholesterol screening in adults without evidence of coronary heart disease.And the checklist was developed by following the NCEP cholesterol management algorithm. A pilot study was conducted and intra-rater reliability of 0.9 was determined.A total of 100 records meeting inclusion criteria were reviewed. Results showed that the cholesterol screening rate was 75% and the compliance rate of providing lifestyle modification counseling to clients with elevated cholesterol level was 58% to 64% which were higher than the findings of other studies. There were 23 current smokers, and 18 of them received smoking cessation counseling which was also higher than the findings of other studies. However, the rate of providing follow-up instruction was poor, only 18% of clients received specific follow-up instruction.