Dr. Peter Birks, Dr. Michelle Wong, and Omosomi Enilama present their talk, “Improving postacute kidney injury care in BC: a collaborative implementation project with nephrologists and primary care providers,” as part of BC Renal and UBC’s provincewide rounds.

0:04:00 – Acute Kidney Injury (AKI)
Dr. Birks starts by providing a general overview of acute kidney injury (AKI), including short and long tern complications (e.g., proteinuria, hypertension, adverse drug events, cardiovascular disease, death, etc.). He discusses the current KDIGO guidelines, noting they are limited. He then highlights data collected on AKI from St. Paul’s Hospital, in Vancouver, and also some data from Ontario, noting incomplete documentation of some AKI cases. He underscores the importance of a comprehensive discharge summary, and how AKI templates can improve documentation.

Dr. Birks then talks about how his research team engaged with BC focus groups, which revealed that primary care providers note a desire for more resources to follow patients after AKI discharge and a desire for more educational resources. AKI is often thought of as a transient issue. They want more guidance on follow up protocols, medication advice, and when to refer patients to a nephrologist.

0:21:00 – New Tools

Dr. Birks notes that, now that their initial surveys are done, they’ve began to create new AKI tools that they plan to implement across the province.

Omo Enilama then provides an overview of the new tools, which include a patient educational handout on AKI, an online toolkit for primary care providers, educational materials for care providers, and an AKI “Sign off/discharge” template. She shares more details on each of these.

0:31:00 – Implementation

Dr. Michelle Wong provides an overview of implementation science and how the team plans to implement their tools into practice. She emphasizes the importance of building partnerships and stakeholder involvement throughout the process, and outlines ways her team is doing this. She says the team is using a mixedmethods pilot study at 3 BC sites for the template and educational resources, and will eventually have a implementation study across BC, potentially using a stepwedge design.

0:47:00 – Summary
Dr. Wong provides a summary of the talk, before the speakers take questions from the audience.