Developing a brief intervention to communicate cardiovascular risk to patients presenting to the emergency department with chest pain: a co-production approach (Ms Stacey Stewart)

The majority of patients presenting to the Emergency Department with chest pain and suspected acute coronary syndrome will be discharged home without further investigation or treatment once myocardial infarction has been ruled out.

However, we are increasingly recognising that high-sensitivity troponin concentrations within the normal reference range are able to help us identify a group of patients without myocardial infarction who are at increased cardiovascular risk.

A brief intervention targeted to this group that informs on subsequent risk and provides guidance on how to reduce risk, could be an effective way of preventing future cardiac events.

I propose to work with patients and healthcare professionals to co-design a brief intervention in the Emergency Department setting that improves communication of cardiovascular risk.

Using a mixed methods approach, I will evaluate the impact of this intervention on subsequent health behaviours and risk factor reduction in a randomised controlled feasibility trial.