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IT Medical Modelling

Prevention Model for Cardiovascular Disease in Australia

Investigators

  • Prof. John McNeil
  • Dr Anna Peeters
  • Dr Theo Vos
  • Dr Danny Liew
  • Mr Stephen Lim

The cardiovascular modelling project has developed methods to allow lifetime projections of cardiac risk amongst individuals or sub-populations of different percentiles of cardiovascular risk. This has resulted in two programs - Take Heart and the CHD Prevention Model.

Take Heart

Take Heart is an interactive program which presents an Australian individual's relative and absolute risk of developing and dying from coronary heart disease based on the major risk factors - age, sex, blood pressure, cholesterol and smoking. The purpose of developing this information system was to allow patients a greater understanding of the impact of high levels of smoking, blood pressure and cholesterol on their future health as well as the benefits to be gained from intervention. An initial version of Take Heart, for use in a workplace setting, was developed with the assistance of BP and has been piloted with the association of the BP medical department. This program has been further adapted and simplified for use in general practice.

CHD Prevention Model

The CHD Prevention Model involves modelling the incidence of fatal and non-fatal CHD within various CHD risk percentiles of an adult population. Using this method involves modelling the incidence of fatal and non-fatal CHD disease within various CHD risk percentiles of an adult population. Using this method, it was found that approximately twenty-five percent of CHD deaths are predicted to occur amongst those in the top ten percentiles of integrated CHD risk, regardless of age group or gender. In addition, all causes survival curves indicated no large differences in all causes survival between the different deciles of CHD risk until around the age of 50 years for males and 60 years for females. In contrast, differences in CHD-event-free survival were apparent around 5-10 years earlier.

The model is now being used to assess the cost effectiveness of various preventive measures in CHD. The project will initially focus on primary interventions but expand subsequently to examine secondary and tertiary programs, enabling cost effectiveness analyses at all levels of cardiovascular health service.