Physicians
Challenge
According to Canadian Guide to Clinical Preventive Health Care, primary prevention poses a challenge for busy physicians. This type of intervention requires an efficient and personalized patient education effort. Persuading patients to quit smoking and to achieve and maintain a healthy weight requires more than merely providing information.
To encourage behaviour change, physicians must assume the role of change agent. It is clear that, to help patients with lifestyle change, clinicians need to expand their skills in counseling and communication, and the patient must also become actively involved in his or her own health.
There’s no question that clinicians’ efforts to counsel patients in areas such as dietary habits, alcohol consumption, physical activity, and tobacco use will have a significant impact on cardiovascular disease and other chronic diseases. The benefit of incorporating prevention into clinical practice has become more apparent with the decline in the incidence of a number of diseases. Age-adjusted mortality from stroke has decreased by 50% in the last 20 years, a trend that may be attributed, in part, to the early detection and treatment of hypertension.1
Solution
Canadian health guidelines recommend a health risk assessment for men over 40, women over 50 or postmenopausal, and any adult with one or more risk factors. INTERxVENT’s comprehensive, confidential health risk assessment can be completed online in the privacy of home.
In addition, programs such as INTERxVENT help physicians—who are often not adequately compensated through provincial health programs for administering and supervising preventive health initiatives—give patients the tools and support they need to make significant lifestyle changes without sacrificing time or resources. Many physicians do not have the time or expertise to provide extensive lifestyle counseling. Often, the degree of counseling required for long-term behaviour change is intensive, and increases among patients with disease complications and co-morbidity. Moreover, physicians are inadequately compensated for treating patients with chronic diseases.
INTERxVENT provides a platform for helping physicians provide and receive compensation for preventative care. For example, the Alberta government—in conjunction with the Alberta Medical Association—launched a new billing code in April 2009 that allows physicians to receive an additional annual fee for managing patients with complex care needs. MCI Medical Clinics Inc., which has eight locations in Alberta, has subsequently licensed INTERxVENT to screen all its clinics’ Alberta patients in order to find those who qualify for the new billing code.
For more information, and to inquire about INTERxVENT programs for a physician practice, please contact us.
1. “Preventative Guidelines: Their Role in Clinical Prevention and Health Promotion.” Canadian Guide to Clinical Preventive Health Care.