RESOURCES

Below are links to useful anticoagulation management resources, in the form of authoritative guidelines, recent papers, books and links to third party websites. We endeavour to keep the information on this page as up-to-date as possible, so keep calling back to remain informed.

Contents

Books
Recent Papers
Reference Materials
NCAT Resource Materials
- 3-day course resource documentation
- Thromboprophylaxis update presentations
- Safe Rx for non-medical precribers presentations
- Where to test? presentations
External Links

Books

Oral anticoagulation management and stroke prevention:
The primary care perspective (3rd Edition)

The primary care perspective provides a valuable reference source, together with a useful theoretical base to accompany the training modules currently offered by the department of primary care and general practice at the university of Birmingham.

Written in an easy-to-follow format, with specific learning outcomes and concise summaries for each chapter, this book is essential reading for any practice interested in developing its expertise in these two areas.

"The content is of high standard, very relevant, and although I have been an anticoagulant nurse for 2 years, I still found the book to be relevant to my education."

Ruth Ogilvie, CLOT Newsletter, Summer 2002, p 2

The book costs £18.95 per copy + £3 p&p, to order a copy, please send a cheque made payable to 'University of Birmingham' and forward to:

Amy Partleton
Primary Care Clinical Sciences
University of Birmingham
Edgbaston
Birmingham
B15 2TT

Please include your contact details at the back of the cheque.

Recent Papers

BAFTA
Birmingham Atrial Fibrillation Treatment in the Aged Study

This landmark study has demonstrated that warfarin is twice as effective as aspirin in protecting against stroke in patients with atrial fibrillation aged 75 and over, whilst being equally as safe in terms of haemorrhagic side-effects.

Mant J, Hobbs FDR, Fletcher K, Roalfe A, Fitzmaurice DA, Lip GYH, Murray ET.
Warfarin versus aspirin for stroke prevention in an elderly population with atrial fibrillation (the Birmingham Atrial Fibrillation treatment of the Aged Study, BAFTA): a randomized controlled trial.
Lancet 2007;370:493-503

SAFE
Screening for Atrial Fibrillation in the Elderly

This Department of Health funded study has demonstrated unequivocally that screening for atrial fibrillation significantly increases the detection of this important condition, and perhaps surprisingly, that opportunistic screening, using pulse palpation followed by ECG, is the most cost-effective screening option

Fitzmaurice DA, Hobbs FDR, Jowett J, Mant J, Murray ET, Holder R, Raftery JP, Bryan S, Davies M, Lip GYH, Allan TF.
Screening versus routine practice in detection of atrial fibrillation in patients aged 65 or over: cluster randomised controlled trial.
BMJ 2007;335:383, doi:10.1136/bmj.39280.660567.55 (published 2 August 2007)

SAFE Companion paper

This SAFE companion paper has demonstrated that, whilst computerised diagnostic software performs better than primary care health professionals in diagnosing atrial fibrillation, in order to ensure a definitive diagnosis a consultant cardiologist needs to report on a 12 lead ECG.

Mant J, Fitzmaurice DA, Hobbs FDR, Jowett S, Murray ET, Holder R, Davies M, Lip GHY.
Accuracy of diagnosing atrial fibrillation on electrocardiogram by primary care practitioners and interpretative diagnostic software: analysis of data from screening for atrial fibrillation in the elderly (SAFE) trial.
BMJ 2007;335: 380, doi:10.1136/bmj.39227.551713.AE (published 29 June 2007)

More information on cardiovascular research at the University of Birmingham.

Details of other research conducted by the University of Birmingham's Department of Primary Care and General Practice can be found here.

Reference Materials

T. P. Baglin,1 D. M. Keeling,2 and H. G. Watson3 for the British Committee for Standards in Haematology
Guidelines on oral anticoagulation (warfarin) ~ Third edition 2005 update
2005 British Society for Haematology, 132, 277–285

Near Patient Testing Working Party, Members of the General Haematology Task Force of BCSH, Members of the Thrombosis and Haemostasis Task Force of the BCSH
Guidelines for Near Patient Testing (NPT) ~ Haematology
Clin Lab Haem 1995 17.301-310

J. Hirsh; L. Poller
The international normalized ratio. A guide to understanding and correcting its problems
Arch Intern Med. 1994;154:282-288.

D A Fitzmaurice, S J Machin on behalf of the British Society of Haematology Task Force for Haemostasis and Thrombosis
Recommendations for patients undertaking self-management of oral anticoagulation
BMJ 2001;323:985–9

Murray, E. T. - Kitchen, D. P. - Kitchen, S. - Jennings, I. - Woods, T. A. L. - Preston, F. E. - Fitzmaurice, D. A.
Patient self-management of oral anticoagulation & external quality assessment procedures
British Journal of Haematology, 2003, 122, 825–828

L Poller, C R Shiach, P K MacCallum, A M Johansen, A M Münster, A Magalhães, J Jespersen, on behalf of the European Concerted Action on Anticoagulation
Multicentre randomised study of computerised anticoagulant dosage
Lancet 1998; 352: 1505–09

David Parry, David Fitzmaurice and James Raftery
Anticoagulation management in primary care: a trial-based econimic evaluation
British Journal of Haematology, 2000, 111, 530-533

No Authors Listed
Risk factors for stroke efficacy of antithrombotic therapy in atrial fibrillation
Arch Intern med 1994; 154:1449-1457

Department of Health National Service Framework – for older People
Modern standards & service models, Standard 5: Stroke

D A Fitzmaurice, P Kesteven, K M Gee, E T Murray and R McManus
A systematic review of outcome measures reported for the effectiveness of oral anticoagulation
J. Clin. Pathol. 2003;56;48-51

Gualtiero Palareti, Nicoletta Leali, Sergio Coccheri, Mario Poggi, Cesare Manotti, Armando D’Angelo, Vittorio Pengo, Nicoletta Erba, Marco Moia, Nicola Ciavarella, Gianluigi Devoto, Mauro Berrettini, Serena Musolesi, on behalf of the Italian Study on Complications of Oral Anticoagulant Therapy
Bleeding complications of oral anticoagulant treatment: An inception-cohort, prospective collaborative study
Lancet 1996; 348: 423–28

FD Hobbs, DA Fitzmaurice, ET Murray, R Holder, PE Rose and JL Roper
Is the international normalized ratio (INR) reliable?
J. Clin. Pathol. 1999;52;494-497

Munir Pirmohamed, Sally James, Shaun Meakin, Chris Green, Andrew K Scott, Thomas J Walley, Keith Farrar, B Kevin Park and Alasdair M Breckenridge
Adverse drug reactions as cause of admission to hospital: prospective analysis of 18,820 patients
BMJ 2004;329;15-19

NCAT Resources (authentication required)

Accredited anticoagulation managment in primary care (3-day)
Click here to access NCAT electronic resources

Thromboprophylaxis for Hospital In-Patients (Update Day)
Click here for PDF presentation downloads

Safe prescribing practice for non-medical prescribers
Click here for PDF presentation downloads

Where To Test? In the laboratory, the practice or the chemist
Click here for PDF presentation downloads

External Links

We are currently reviewing our list of external links, in the mean time If you know of a web site you think should be added, please email the details...