Improving Patient Outcomes for COPD

About this On Demand Training

Improving Patient Outcomes Through Screening, Follow-Up and Treatment of Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease

Estimate Time for Completion: 120 minutes

COPD is a long-term lung disease that impairs an individual’s ability to breathe. Disease progression worsens over time and negatively affects an individual’s ability to perform simple activities of daily living such as walking, climbing stairs, sleeping and other activities. Beyond this, the disease may also increase emergency department visits and hospitalizations due to COPD exacerbations. It is estimated that COPD affects around 20 million (12%) adults in the United States, but there could be millions more who have the disease without realizing it, due to gaps in diagnosis.

Although there is no cure for COPD, it is often preventable and can be effectively managed through treatment. Because most patients are diagnosed by their primary care clinician, those providers must be prepared to address the highly variable clinical features and responses to therapy. Additionally, diagnosis and treatment of COPD is rapidly changing, so understanding recent advances is important for delivery of optimal patient care.

This course will provide health care professionals with the education needed to properly identify and diagnose COPD, establish a treatment plan, monitor disease progression and utilize telemedicine to improve patient outcomes and reduce the disease burden of COPD.

This program is supported by an independent educational grant from AstraZeneca.

What You Will Learn

After successful completion of this activity, learners will be able to:

• Recognize the health and economic impact of COPD on a national and global level.
• Discuss options for accurate and early diagnosis of COPD.
• Distinguish between treatment options to create individualized treatment plans that meet patient needs and determine when a specialist referral is indicated.
• Prescribe both pharmacological and non-pharmacological treatment for patients with COPD.
• Understand the patient experience of living with and managing COPD.
• Utilize telemedicine effectively as a tool to provide care for COPD.

Who Should Attend

This education program is geared toward members of interdisciplinary health care teams (physicians, nurses, physician assistants, pharmacists, psychologists, social workers and others) practicing in primary care settings.

Faculty

Laura Feemster, MD, MS

Laura Feemster, MD, MS is an Assistant Professor of Medicine, Division of Pulmonary and Critical Care at the University of Washington and Core Investigator at the VA Health Services Research & Development Center of Innovation for Veteran-Centered and Value-Driven Care. Dr. Feemster received her undergraduate degree from Texas A&M University, medical degree from the University of Texas Southwestern Medical School and a Master of Science in Epidemiology from the University of Washington. She completed her clinical training, including residency and fellowship, at the University of Washington Affiliated Hospitals in Seattle, WA.

Dr. Feemster's early research work sought to understand the impact of health behaviors (substance use, tobacco cessation and adherence) on patient-centered outcomes in chronic lung disease. She has experience with intervention studies to improve the quality of patient-clinician communication among patients with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) and other serious illness. More recently, her research has focused on assessing quality of care and improving care delivery for patients with COPD. She is the recipient of an National Institutes of Health National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute K23 career development award designed to evaluate receipt of guideline-recommended COPD care and intervene in the primary care setting to increase the delivery of high-quality COPD care, using a behaviorally based intervention. She is co-leading a VA QUERI project seeking to de-implement inappropriate inhaled corticosteroid use among patients with COPD. She has additional expertise in the use of performance metrics to assess implementation of evidence-based care, with appointments to National Committee for Quality Assurance Respiratory Measure Advisory Panel, as well as the American Thoracic Society Quality Improvement and Document Development & Implementation Committees.

Dr. Feemster has no financial relationships to disclose relating to the subject matter of this presentation.

Sanjay Sethi, MD

As chief of the division of pulmonary, critical care and sleep medicine with the Jacobs School of Medicine and Biomedical Sciences at SUNY University at Buffalo, Dr. Sethi oversees clinical, teaching, research and administrative tasks related to the evaluation and treatment of adult patients with lung diseases and sleep disorders as well as critically ill patients. His outpatient practice is at UBMD Internal Medicine clinics at Conventus in the Downtown Medical Campus and at Youngs road in Amherst. His inpatient practice is primarily located at the VA Medical Center (VA) in Buffalo. Members of Dr. Sethi's division provide care at sites throughout Buffalo, including the UBMD clinics, UBMD Sleep Center and other UB-affiliated hospitals.

Dr. Sethi also conducts research on one of the most common lung diseases: chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), which includes chronic bronchitis and emphysema, and lung infections such as bronchitis and pneumonia. Interestingly, patients with COPD become more prone to lung infection, and understanding why and how this happens is his main research interest. In addition to bench research in this field, he is also working to develop better ways to prevent and treat these infections by leading and participating in several clinical research studies in this field that are open to both veterans and the general public. Dr. Sethi leads a multidisciplinary research team based at UB and the VA that includes pulmonary and infectious disease physicians, post-doctoral scientists, nurse coordinators and research assistants. Through mentored research programs, the laboratories train undergraduate and graduate students, residents and fellows.

Dr. Sethi is active in several professional organizations and have served as a consultant on the Global Initiative for Chronic Obstructive Lung Disease (GOLD) guidelines.

Faculty Disclosure

Dr. Sethi has the following disclosures:

• Grant/Research Support: CIpla, Regeneron
• Consultant: AstraZeneca, GlaxoSmithKline, Theravance, Nuvaira, Manarini, OmPharma
• Speaker's Bureau: AstraZeneca, GlaxoSmithKline

Joseph Brennan

Joseph Brennan is an advisor to the American Telemedicine Association and a telehealth consultant at Moonshot Health Consulting. Prior to starting Moonshot Health Consulting, he served as Senior Director of the Virtual Health program at Spectrum Health based in Western Michigan. He has worked with many healthcare organizations on the development and scale of telehealth including the recent launch of Yale New Haven Health's Video Care OnDemand program and rapid expansion in response to COVID-19.  Joe has championed several pioneering components of a telehealth program, including a robust dashboard for outcomes analytics, a custom developed mobile app, and a digitally-driven, multimodal advertising strategy. He has been an advocate for telehealth at both the state and federal levels of government, testifying before the Michigan House of Representatives and the Michigan Senate about the positive impact of telehealth .  Joe is bronze certified in Lean Process Improvement and LEAD certified in the Stanford Design Thinking Process. Prior to his work in telehealth, Joe served in various positions in technology and start-up entrepreneurship.

Mr. Brennan has no financial relationships to disclose relating to the subject matter of this presentation.

All of the relevant financial relationships listed for these individuals have been mitigated.

Continuing Education

In support of improving patient care, the National Committee for Quality Assurance is jointly accredited by the Accreditation Council for Continuing Medical Education (ACCME), the Accreditation Council for Pharmacy Education (ACPE), the American Nurses Credentialing Center (ANCC) to provide Interprofessional Continuing Education for the healthcare team. 

This activity was planned by and for the healthcare team, and learners will receive 2.0 Interprofessional Continuing Education (IPCE) credit for learning and change. 

This educational activity is approved for: 2.0 AMA PRA Category 1 Credit^TM and ACPE.

This educational activity is approved for 2.0 nursing contact hours.*

The assigned universal program number: JA0004597-0000-21-001-H04-P. Upon successful completion of this program (attending the full session and completing a program evaluation), participants will access CPE Monitor on the ACPE website to locate and track their CPE statement of credit.

This program grants 2.0 Continuing Education Unit (CEU) points for PCMH Certified Content Experts.  This program is not considered a required CCE quarterly webinar.

* Please note – You must attend the entire program to be eligible for total number of contact hours. 

ATTENTION: Effective February 1, 2022, this on-demand (enduring material) activity no longer offers credits for the American Academy of Physician Assistants (AAPA), the American Psychological Association (APA), or the Association of Social Work Boards (ASWB). Only applicable professionals who fully completed this on-demand activity prior to February 1, 2022, are eligible for AAPA, APA, or ASWB credits. No other CEUs are impacted by this change.

Event Type

1. Self Paced