Optimising Management of Patients with Heart Failure with Preserved Ejection Fraction in Primary Care (Optimise-HFpEF)

Heart failure (HF) is a condition in which the heart does not work well to pump blood around the body. About half of all people with HF have a type in which the heart is very stiff. This type is more common in older people with a history of high blood pressure, obesity and diabetes, but it is hard to diagnose and poorly understood. No specific drugs have been found to help it, except for diuretics or ‘water pills’. For now, recommendations for managing this type of HF focus on controlling blood pressure, blood sugar, and being active. Most patients are looked after in general practice sometimes in collaboration with specialists. In this study we want to identify and follow a group of patients with this type of HF for a year to better understand their HF, their other conditions, needs for support, experience of treatment, and if they have problems requiring hospital care. We will collect information at the start, then 6 and 12 months later. We will also interview patients and health care professionals from general practice and cardiology services to discuss how we can improve care of patients. Interviews will be confidential, can be by telephone or in a place of the person’s choosing, and will be audio-recorded then typed out. We will use the information from the data collected and from a review of other studies, to develop the best (optimised) way of managing patients with collaboration between general practice and specialist services. We will invite patients and health care professionals to work with us to agree ways of managing patients that are practical and acceptable to patients and healthcare providers. The final agreed optimised management programme will be tested in future studies to see whether it improves patients’ care and health outcomes.