Improving Heart Failure Patient Engagement with Mobile Apps Using Nurse Navigators.

ABSTRACT: Providing high-quality heart failure education through smartphone applications (apps) empowers patients to more successfully manage their disease process outside the hospital setting. The purpose of this project was to evaluate the addition of nurse navigators to increase engagement of newly-diagnosed heart failure patients with the GetWell Loop (GWL) technology program that assists patient learning and monitoring for self-care. Adding navigators increased patient engagement with the GWL over the use of the GWL without navigators.

A novel colorectal cancer test combining microsatellite instability and BRAF/RAS analysis: Clinical validation and impact on Lynch syndrome screening.

Background: Lynch syndrome (LS) is under-diagnosed. UK National Institute for Health and Care Excellence guidelines recommend multistep molecular testing of all colorectal cancers (CRCs) to screen for LS. However, the complexity of the pathway has resulted in limited improvement in diagnosis. Methods: One-step multiplex PCR was used to generate sequencing-ready amplicons from 14 microsatellite instability (MSI) markers and 22 BRAF, KRAS, and NRAS mutation hotspots. MSI and BRAF/RAS variants were detected using amplicon-sequencing and automated analysis. The assay was clinically validated and deployed into service in northern England, followed by regional and local audits to assess its impact. Results: MSI analysis achieved 99.1% sensitivity and 99.2% specificity and was reproducible (r = 0.995). Mutation hotspot analysis had 100% sensitivity, 99.9% specificity, and was reproducible (r = 0.998). Assay-use in service in 2022-2023 increased CRC testing (97.2% (2466/2536) versus 28.6% (601/2104)), halved turnaround times, and identified more CRC patients at-risk of LS (5.5% (139/2536) versus 2.9% (61/2104)) compared to 2019-2020 when a multi-test pathway was used. Conclusion: A novel amplicon-sequencing assay of CRCs, including all biomarkers for LS screening and anti-EGFR therapy, achieved >95% testing rate. Adoption of this low cost, scalable, and fully automatable test will complement on-going, national initiatives to improve LS screening.