Shanti Raman¹, Joanna Nathan¹, Larissa Passarello¹, Slavica Krstic¹, Siah Kim²
1- South Western Sydney Local Health District, Australia
2- Sydney Children's Hospital Network, Australia
Abstract Body
Background: Despite the known rise in chronic diseases, systematic blood pressure (BP) screening in Paediatric community clinics remains challenging. As part of quality improvement, we evaluated BP measurement practices, barriers to routine screening and documentation, and clinician responses to abnormal readings.
Methods: We audited electronic medical records for children aged 3–18 years attending Resilient Kids Clinics (RKC) in South Western Sydney , pre- and post-intervention over six months.The intervention comprised clinician education and equipment standardisation. Contemporaneously we audited a weight-management clinic (GHK) as benchmark. A clinician survey assessed perceived barriers/enablers.
Results: 245 children (RKC pre n=66, post n=100; GHK n=79; mean age 9.37±4.0 years) wereincluded. BP measurement increased from 51.5% (RKC pre) to 67 .0% (post) (? ²(1)=4.00, p=0.045),and post-intervention rates were comparable to GHK (70.9%, p=0.578). Measurement improved with age (from 9.1% in