Clinical Review
Does Clinical Inertia Vary According to Provider Type?
Managing Hypertension in Primary Care
Fed Pract. 2008 November;25(11):21
Author and Disclosure Information
Daniel G. Federman, MD, Kirsha S. Gordon, MS, Joseph Goulet, PhD, MS, Sue Kancir, RN, Woody Levin, MS, Shawn L. Fultz, MD, MPH, and Amy C. Justice, MD, PhD
Dr. Federman is a staff physician in the department of medicine at the West Haven campus of the VA Connecticut Healthcare System (VACHS) and a professor of medicine in the department of internal medicine at Yale University School of Medicine, New Haven. Ms. Gordon is a biostatistician for the Veterans Aging Cohort Study (VACS), located at the West Haven campus of the VACHS. Dr. Goulet is the director of the biostatistics core of the VACS and an associate research scientist at Yale University School of Medicine. Ms. Kancir is a registered nurse in the department of quality management at the West Haven campus of the VACHS. Mr. Levin is an information technology consultant for the VACS. At the time of this study, Dr. Fultz was a staff physician at the West Haven campus of the VACHS. He is now a senior medical advisor for the VA Office of Public Health and Scientific Hazards, Washington, DC. Dr. Justice is the section chief of general internal medicine at the West Haven campus of the VACHS and an associate professor of medicine in the department of internal medicine at Yale University School of Medicine.
Despite the well established risks of persistently elevated blood pressure, as well as the benefits of controlling such elevations, hypertension remains underdiagnosed and undertreated. These VA researchers compared the rates of antihypertensive medication intensification between resident physicians, midlevel practitioners, and attending physicians.