Vasc-Alert User Documentation

Access Risk Score Reset Documentation

Owned by Douglas Curry
Last updated: Jun 11, 2021 by John Kennedy (Unlicensed)
2 min read

Why a Reset is necessary

The Access Risk Score (ARS) is derived from 5 factors calculated by Vasc-Alert. See the Access Risk Score in the documentation. Currently, they are averaged over the prior 28 days of treatments. When a patient has had an interventional procedure such as an angioplasty, the procedure was performed to address an issue in the access so you would expect that the intra-access pressures would change. In order for the ARS to adjust to this revised access and reflect accurately what is going on in the access, the score needs to be reset so it ignores the data gathered prior to the procedure.

For the Access Risk Score to be reset, Vasc-Alert must receive intervention information electronically, or it must be entered by the dialysis staff into the Vasc-Alert website. Without this intervention information, a reset cannot occur.

 

What is a “reset” and how would it work for the Access Risk Score?

“Reset” is defined as restarting calculations of the access risk score (ARS), so that no data from before the intervention is incorporated into the calculations of the individual score elements, and by extension of the overall score.

  1. The scores of the individual elements are calculated based only on data from encounters after the intervention. This contrasts with the current rule which uses a moving window of 28 days regardless of what might happen during those 28 days.

  2. As is currently the case, a minimum number of encounters with non-null average VAPR values are required to calculate the treatment-level ARS. The current minimum value is 5 treatments, meaning that the 5th encounter with a non-null averageVAPR is the first one to have an ARS.

  3. Starting with the 5th treatment after the intervention the ARS is calculated again and shown on the patient detail report and triage list.

  4. During the reset period, Vasc-Alert VAPR and AAPR results will still be calculated and should be used to identify potential post-intervention complications .

 

The on-line patient detail view will show “No Score” for the treatments during the reset period.

 

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