ArticlePloS one2017
Opportunistic screening for atrial fibrillation in a real-life setting in general practice in Denmark-The Atrial Fibrillation Found On Routine Detection (AFFORD) non-interventional study.
Article in PloS one, 2017. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 10 papers, 2 of them syntheses that pooled it.
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Who cites it
10 citing papers in PubMed, 2 syntheses or guidelines pooled it, 18 citations in OpenAlex.
- Nurse-led atrial fibrillation clinics in primary health care: a review of the evidence.Scandinavian journal of primary health care · 2025Pooled it
- Utility of risk prediction models to detect atrial fibrillation in screened participants.European journal of preventive cardiology · 2021Pooled it
- Global implementation and evaluation of atrial fibrillation screening in the past two decades - a narrative review.NPJ cardiovascular health · 2024Review
- General practitioners' perceptions on opportunistic single-time point screening for atrial fibrillation: A European quantitative survey.Frontiers in cardiovascular medicine · 2023Article
- Performance of pulse palpation compared to one-lead ECG in atrial fibrillation screening.Clinical cardiology · 2021Article
- A Heart Rate Monitoring App (FibriCheck) for Atrial Fibrillation in General Practice: Pilot Usability Study.JMIR formative research · 2021Article
- Continuous electrocardiography for detecting atrial fibrillation beyond 1 year after stroke in primary care.Heart (British Cardiac Society) · 2021Article
- Acceleration of opportunistic atrial fibrillation screening for elderly patients in routine primary care.PloS one · 2020Observational
- How do Dutch general practitioners detect and diagnose atrial fibrillation? Results of an online case vignette study.BMC family practice · 2019Article
- Diagnostic accuracies of screening for atrial fibrillation by cardiac nurses versus radiographers.Open heartArticle
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Authors and funding
7 authors at 4 institutions in 1 country.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
Atrial fibrillation (AF) is a chronic disease with an incidence increasing steeply by age and affecting more than 11 million patients in Europe and the United States. Diagnosing AF is essential for the prevention of stroke by oral anticoagulation. Opportunistic screening for AF in patients ≥65 years of age is recommended by the European and Danish Societies of Cardiology. The study aim was to examine the detection rate of AF in consecutively screened patients in the primary care setting in Denmark. In an open, non-interventional, cluster, multicenter, cross-sectional, observational study patients ≥65 years of age entering consecutively into general practice clinics were invited to nurse-assisted opportunistic screening for AF. The General Practice (GP) clinics participating were randomized to patient inclusion in three age groups: 65-74, 75-84, and ≥85 years respectively. All patients underwent pulse palpation followed by 12-led electrocardiogram in case of irregular pulse. Two cardiologists validated all electrocardiogram examinations. Forty-nine general practice clinics recruited in total 970 patients split into three age groups; 480 patients (65-74 years), 372 (75-84 years), and 118 patients ≥85 years of age. Co-morbidities increased by age with hypertension being most frequent. Eighty-seven patients (9%) were detected with an irregular pulse, representing 4.4%, 10.5% and 22.9%, respectively in the three age groups. Assessment of electrocardiograms by the GP showed suspicion of AF in 13 patients with final verification of electrocardiograms by cardiologists revealing 10 AF-patients. The highest detection rate of AF was found in the ≥85 age group (3.39%) followed by the 65-74 age group (0.83%) and the 75-84 age group (0.54%). Opportunistic screening of AF in primary care is feasible and do result in the detection of new AF-patients. Close collaboration with cardiologists is advisable to avoid false positive screening results.
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