Guidelines

The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services has approved Colorado’s request to require some private insurers in the state to cover gender-affirming care.

The approval means transgender-related care must be included as part of the essential benefits offered on the state’s Affordable Care Act marketplace, which includes private individual and small group insurance plans. The coverage will start Jan. 1, 2023. Colorado is the first state in the United States to require such coverage.

The HHS notes that gender-affirming treatments to be covered include eye and lid modifications, face tightening, facial bone remodeling for facial feminization, breast/chest construction and reductions, and laser hair removal.

“I am proud to stand with Colorado to remove barriers that have historically made it difficult for transgender people to access health coverage and medical care,” said HHS Secretary Xavier Becerra in a statement.

“Colorado’s expansion of their essential health benefits to include gender-affirming surgery and other treatments is a model for other states to follow, and we invite other states to follow suit,” said Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services Administrator Chiquita Brooks-LaSure in the statement.

Medicaid already covers comprehensive transgender care in Colorado.

The LGBTQ+ advocacy group One Colorado estimated that, thanks to the Affordable Care Act, only 5% of the state’s LGBTQ+ community was uninsured in 2019, compared to 10% in 2011.

However, 34% of transgender respondents to a One Colorado poll in 2018 said they had been denied coverage for an LGBTQ-specific medical service, such as gender-affirming care. Sixty-two percent said that a lack of insurance or limited insurance was a barrier to care; 84% said another barrier was the lack of adequately trained mental and behavioral health professionals.
 

Mental health also covered

The Colorado plan requires individual and small group plans to cover an annual 45- to 60-minute mental health wellness exam with a qualified mental health care practitioner. The visit can include behavioral health screening, education and consultation about healthy lifestyle changes, referrals to mental health treatment, and discussion of potential medication options.

The plans also must cover an additional 15 medications as alternatives to opioids and up to six acupuncture visits annually.

“This plan expands access to mental health services for Coloradans while helping those fighting substance abuse to overcome their addiction,” said Governor Jared Polis in a statement.

“This improves care for Coloradans and ensures that even more Coloradans have access to help when they need it,” he said.

A version of this article first appeared on Medscape.com.

The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services has approved Colorado’s request to require some private insurers in the state to cover gender-affirming care.

The approval means transgender-related care must be included as part of the essential benefits offered on the state’s Affordable Care Act marketplace, which includes private individual and small group insurance plans. The coverage will start Jan. 1, 2023. Colorado is the first state in the United States to require such coverage.

The HHS notes that gender-affirming treatments to be covered include eye and lid modifications, face tightening, facial bone remodeling for facial feminization, breast/chest construction and reductions, and laser hair removal.

“I am proud to stand with Colorado to remove barriers that have historically made it difficult for transgender people to access health coverage and medical care,” said HHS Secretary Xavier Becerra in a statement.

“Colorado’s expansion of their essential health benefits to include gender-affirming surgery and other treatments is a model for other states to follow, and we invite other states to follow suit,” said Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services Administrator Chiquita Brooks-LaSure in the statement.

Medicaid already covers comprehensive transgender care in Colorado.

The LGBTQ+ advocacy group One Colorado estimated that, thanks to the Affordable Care Act, only 5% of the state’s LGBTQ+ community was uninsured in 2019, compared to 10% in 2011.

However, 34% of transgender respondents to a One Colorado poll in 2018 said they had been denied coverage for an LGBTQ-specific medical service, such as gender-affirming care. Sixty-two percent said that a lack of insurance or limited insurance was a barrier to care; 84% said another barrier was the lack of adequately trained mental and behavioral health professionals.
 

Mental health also covered

The Colorado plan requires individual and small group plans to cover an annual 45- to 60-minute mental health wellness exam with a qualified mental health care practitioner. The visit can include behavioral health screening, education and consultation about healthy lifestyle changes, referrals to mental health treatment, and discussion of potential medication options.

The plans also must cover an additional 15 medications as alternatives to opioids and up to six acupuncture visits annually.

“This plan expands access to mental health services for Coloradans while helping those fighting substance abuse to overcome their addiction,” said Governor Jared Polis in a statement.

“This improves care for Coloradans and ensures that even more Coloradans have access to help when they need it,” he said.

A version of this article first appeared on Medscape.com.

The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services has approved Colorado’s request to require some private insurers in the state to cover gender-affirming care.

The approval means transgender-related care must be included as part of the essential benefits offered on the state’s Affordable Care Act marketplace, which includes private individual and small group insurance plans. The coverage will start Jan. 1, 2023. Colorado is the first state in the United States to require such coverage.

The HHS notes that gender-affirming treatments to be covered include eye and lid modifications, face tightening, facial bone remodeling for facial feminization, breast/chest construction and reductions, and laser hair removal.

“I am proud to stand with Colorado to remove barriers that have historically made it difficult for transgender people to access health coverage and medical care,” said HHS Secretary Xavier Becerra in a statement.

“Colorado’s expansion of their essential health benefits to include gender-affirming surgery and other treatments is a model for other states to follow, and we invite other states to follow suit,” said Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services Administrator Chiquita Brooks-LaSure in the statement.

Medicaid already covers comprehensive transgender care in Colorado.

The LGBTQ+ advocacy group One Colorado estimated that, thanks to the Affordable Care Act, only 5% of the state’s LGBTQ+ community was uninsured in 2019, compared to 10% in 2011.

However, 34% of transgender respondents to a One Colorado poll in 2018 said they had been denied coverage for an LGBTQ-specific medical service, such as gender-affirming care. Sixty-two percent said that a lack of insurance or limited insurance was a barrier to care; 84% said another barrier was the lack of adequately trained mental and behavioral health professionals.
 

Mental health also covered

The Colorado plan requires individual and small group plans to cover an annual 45- to 60-minute mental health wellness exam with a qualified mental health care practitioner. The visit can include behavioral health screening, education and consultation about healthy lifestyle changes, referrals to mental health treatment, and discussion of potential medication options.

The plans also must cover an additional 15 medications as alternatives to opioids and up to six acupuncture visits annually.

“This plan expands access to mental health services for Coloradans while helping those fighting substance abuse to overcome their addiction,” said Governor Jared Polis in a statement.

“This improves care for Coloradans and ensures that even more Coloradans have access to help when they need it,” he said.

A version of this article first appeared on Medscape.com.

A new position statement from the Royal Australian and New Zealand College of Psychiatrists (RANZCP) stresses the importance of a mental health evaluation for people with gender dysphoria – in particular for children and adolescents – before any firm decisions are made on whether to prescribe hormonal treatments to transition, or perform surgeries, often referred to as “gender-affirming care.”

“There is a paucity of quality evidence on the outcomes of those presenting with gender dysphoria. In particular, there is a need for better evidence in relation to outcomes for children and young people,” the guidance states.

Because gender dysphoria “is associated with significant distress ... each case should be assessed by a mental health professional, which will frequently be a psychiatrist, with the person at the center of care. It is important the psychological state and context in which gender dysphoria has arisen is explored to assess the most appropriate treatment,” it adds.

The move by the psychiatry body represents a big shift in the landscape regarding recommendations for the treatment of gender dysphoria in Australia and New Zealand.

Asked to explain the new RANZCP position, Philip Morris, MBBS, FRANZCP, said: “The College acknowledged the complexity of the issues and the legitimacy of different approaches.”

Exploration of a patient’s reasons for identifying as transgender is essential, he said in an interview, especially when it comes to young people.

“There may be other reasons for doing it, and we need to look for those, identify them and treat them. This needs to be done before initiating hormones and changing the whole physical nature of the child,” he said.

“A cautious psychotherapy-first approach makes sense. If we can do that with adolescents, then we will take a big step in the right direction,” stressed Dr. Morris, who is president of the National Association of Practising Psychiatrists in Australia.
 

Keira Bell case and Scandinavian stance lead to more open discussion

The rapid rise in gender dysphoria among adolescents in the Western world, referred to as “rapid-onset” or “late-onset” gender dysphoria, has seen a huge increase in the number of natal girls presenting and created frenzied debate that has intensified worldwide in the last 12 months about how to best treat youth with gender dysphoria.

Concerns have arisen that some transgender identification is due to social contagion, and there is a growing number of “detransitioners” – people who identified as transgender, transitioned to the opposite gender, but then regretted their decision, changed their minds, and “detransitioned” back to their birth sex. If they have had hormone therapy, and in some cases surgery, they are left with irreversible changes to their bodies.

As a result, Scandinavian countries, most notably Finland, once eager advocates of the gender-affirmative approach, have pulled back and issued new treatment guidelines in 2020 stating that psychotherapy, rather than gender reassignment, should be the first line of treatment for gender-dysphoric youth.

This, along with a landmark High Court decision in the U.K. regarding the use of puberty-blocking drugs for children with gender dysphoria, brought by detransitioner Keira Bell, which was recently overturned by the Appeal Court, but which Ms. Bell now says she will take to the Supreme Court, has led to a considerable shift in the conversation around treating transgender adolescents with hormonal therapy, says Dr. Morris.

“This [has moved from] ... a topic that could previously not be talked about freely to one that we can discuss more openly now. This is a big improvement. Previously, everyone thought it was all settled, but it’s not, certainly not from a medical angle,” he states.
 

At odds with prior Australian recommendations

The RANZCP had previously endorsed the standard guidelines of the Royal Children’s Hospital (RCH) Melbourne, followed by most gender-identity services in Australia and similar guidance from New Zealand, which both recommend gender-affirming care.

“Increasing evidence demonstrates that with supportive, gender-affirming care during childhood and adolescence, harms can be ameliorated and mental health and well-being outcomes can be significantly improved,” state the RCH guidelines.

But in 2019, RANZCP removed its endorsement of the RCH guidelines and started a consultation, which resulted in the new position statement.

However, Ken Pang, MD, of the Murdoch Children’s Research Institute in Melbourne and an author of the RCH guidelines, says the key recommendations of the new RANZCP position statement are consistent with their own guidelines.

The former note “the need for a skilled mental health clinician in providing comprehensive exploration of a child or adolescent’s biopsychosocial context,” Dr. Pang says.

However, it’s difficult not to see the contrast in stance when the new RANZCP statement maintains: “Research on gender dysphoria is still emerging. There are polarized views and mixed evidence regarding treatment options for people presenting with gender identity concerns, especially children and young people.”

Dr. Pang says the RCH guidelines do, however, recognize the need for further research in the field.

“I look forward to being able to incorporate such research, including from our own Trans20 study, into future revisions of our guidelines,” he told this news organization.
 

Watch your backs with affirmative therapy: Will there be a compromise?

Dr. Morris says there will obviously be cases where “the child might transition with a medical intervention, but that wouldn’t be the first step.”

And yet, he adds, “There are those who push the pro-trans view that everyone should be allowed to transition, and the doctors are only technicians that provide hormones with no questions asked.” 

But from a doctor’s perspective, clinicians will still be held responsible in medical and legal terms for the treatments given, he stressed.

“I don’t think they will ever not be accountable for that. They will always need to determine in their own mind whether their actions have positive value that outweigh any disadvantages,” Dr. Morris continues.

The RANZCP statement does, in fact, stress just this.

All health care professionals need to “be aware of ethical and medicolegal dilemmas” pertaining to affirmative therapy, it indicates. “Psychiatrists should practice within the relevant laws and accepted professional standards in relation to assessing capacity and obtaining consent...”

Dr. Morris hopes there will ultimately be many more checks and balances in place and that courts and clinicians will need to step back and not assume every child who seeks to transition is doing it as a result of pure gender dysphoria.

He predicts that things will end in a compromise. 

“In my view, this compromise will treat children with respect and approach them like any other patient that presents with a condition that requires proper assessment and treatment.”

“In the end, some cases will be transitioned, but there will be fewer than [are] transitioned at the moment,” he predicts.

Dr. Morris has reported no relevant financial relationships. Dr. Pang is a member of the Australian Professional Association for Trans Health and its research committee.

A version of this article first appeared on Medscape.com.

A new position statement from the Royal Australian and New Zealand College of Psychiatrists (RANZCP) stresses the importance of a mental health evaluation for people with gender dysphoria – in particular for children and adolescents – before any firm decisions are made on whether to prescribe hormonal treatments to transition, or perform surgeries, often referred to as “gender-affirming care.”

“There is a paucity of quality evidence on the outcomes of those presenting with gender dysphoria. In particular, there is a need for better evidence in relation to outcomes for children and young people,” the guidance states.

Because gender dysphoria “is associated with significant distress ... each case should be assessed by a mental health professional, which will frequently be a psychiatrist, with the person at the center of care. It is important the psychological state and context in which gender dysphoria has arisen is explored to assess the most appropriate treatment,” it adds.

The move by the psychiatry body represents a big shift in the landscape regarding recommendations for the treatment of gender dysphoria in Australia and New Zealand.

Asked to explain the new RANZCP position, Philip Morris, MBBS, FRANZCP, said: “The College acknowledged the complexity of the issues and the legitimacy of different approaches.”

Exploration of a patient’s reasons for identifying as transgender is essential, he said in an interview, especially when it comes to young people.

“There may be other reasons for doing it, and we need to look for those, identify them and treat them. This needs to be done before initiating hormones and changing the whole physical nature of the child,” he said.

“A cautious psychotherapy-first approach makes sense. If we can do that with adolescents, then we will take a big step in the right direction,” stressed Dr. Morris, who is president of the National Association of Practising Psychiatrists in Australia.
 

Keira Bell case and Scandinavian stance lead to more open discussion

The rapid rise in gender dysphoria among adolescents in the Western world, referred to as “rapid-onset” or “late-onset” gender dysphoria, has seen a huge increase in the number of natal girls presenting and created frenzied debate that has intensified worldwide in the last 12 months about how to best treat youth with gender dysphoria.

Concerns have arisen that some transgender identification is due to social contagion, and there is a growing number of “detransitioners” – people who identified as transgender, transitioned to the opposite gender, but then regretted their decision, changed their minds, and “detransitioned” back to their birth sex. If they have had hormone therapy, and in some cases surgery, they are left with irreversible changes to their bodies.

As a result, Scandinavian countries, most notably Finland, once eager advocates of the gender-affirmative approach, have pulled back and issued new treatment guidelines in 2020 stating that psychotherapy, rather than gender reassignment, should be the first line of treatment for gender-dysphoric youth.

This, along with a landmark High Court decision in the U.K. regarding the use of puberty-blocking drugs for children with gender dysphoria, brought by detransitioner Keira Bell, which was recently overturned by the Appeal Court, but which Ms. Bell now says she will take to the Supreme Court, has led to a considerable shift in the conversation around treating transgender adolescents with hormonal therapy, says Dr. Morris.

“This [has moved from] ... a topic that could previously not be talked about freely to one that we can discuss more openly now. This is a big improvement. Previously, everyone thought it was all settled, but it’s not, certainly not from a medical angle,” he states.
 

At odds with prior Australian recommendations

The RANZCP had previously endorsed the standard guidelines of the Royal Children’s Hospital (RCH) Melbourne, followed by most gender-identity services in Australia and similar guidance from New Zealand, which both recommend gender-affirming care.

“Increasing evidence demonstrates that with supportive, gender-affirming care during childhood and adolescence, harms can be ameliorated and mental health and well-being outcomes can be significantly improved,” state the RCH guidelines.

But in 2019, RANZCP removed its endorsement of the RCH guidelines and started a consultation, which resulted in the new position statement.

However, Ken Pang, MD, of the Murdoch Children’s Research Institute in Melbourne and an author of the RCH guidelines, says the key recommendations of the new RANZCP position statement are consistent with their own guidelines.

The former note “the need for a skilled mental health clinician in providing comprehensive exploration of a child or adolescent’s biopsychosocial context,” Dr. Pang says.

However, it’s difficult not to see the contrast in stance when the new RANZCP statement maintains: “Research on gender dysphoria is still emerging. There are polarized views and mixed evidence regarding treatment options for people presenting with gender identity concerns, especially children and young people.”

Dr. Pang says the RCH guidelines do, however, recognize the need for further research in the field.

“I look forward to being able to incorporate such research, including from our own Trans20 study, into future revisions of our guidelines,” he told this news organization.
 

Watch your backs with affirmative therapy: Will there be a compromise?

Dr. Morris says there will obviously be cases where “the child might transition with a medical intervention, but that wouldn’t be the first step.”

And yet, he adds, “There are those who push the pro-trans view that everyone should be allowed to transition, and the doctors are only technicians that provide hormones with no questions asked.” 

But from a doctor’s perspective, clinicians will still be held responsible in medical and legal terms for the treatments given, he stressed.

“I don’t think they will ever not be accountable for that. They will always need to determine in their own mind whether their actions have positive value that outweigh any disadvantages,” Dr. Morris continues.

The RANZCP statement does, in fact, stress just this.

All health care professionals need to “be aware of ethical and medicolegal dilemmas” pertaining to affirmative therapy, it indicates. “Psychiatrists should practice within the relevant laws and accepted professional standards in relation to assessing capacity and obtaining consent...”

Dr. Morris hopes there will ultimately be many more checks and balances in place and that courts and clinicians will need to step back and not assume every child who seeks to transition is doing it as a result of pure gender dysphoria.

He predicts that things will end in a compromise. 

“In my view, this compromise will treat children with respect and approach them like any other patient that presents with a condition that requires proper assessment and treatment.”

“In the end, some cases will be transitioned, but there will be fewer than [are] transitioned at the moment,” he predicts.

Dr. Morris has reported no relevant financial relationships. Dr. Pang is a member of the Australian Professional Association for Trans Health and its research committee.

A version of this article first appeared on Medscape.com.

A new position statement from the Royal Australian and New Zealand College of Psychiatrists (RANZCP) stresses the importance of a mental health evaluation for people with gender dysphoria – in particular for children and adolescents – before any firm decisions are made on whether to prescribe hormonal treatments to transition, or perform surgeries, often referred to as “gender-affirming care.”

“There is a paucity of quality evidence on the outcomes of those presenting with gender dysphoria. In particular, there is a need for better evidence in relation to outcomes for children and young people,” the guidance states.

Because gender dysphoria “is associated with significant distress ... each case should be assessed by a mental health professional, which will frequently be a psychiatrist, with the person at the center of care. It is important the psychological state and context in which gender dysphoria has arisen is explored to assess the most appropriate treatment,” it adds.

The move by the psychiatry body represents a big shift in the landscape regarding recommendations for the treatment of gender dysphoria in Australia and New Zealand.

Asked to explain the new RANZCP position, Philip Morris, MBBS, FRANZCP, said: “The College acknowledged the complexity of the issues and the legitimacy of different approaches.”

Exploration of a patient’s reasons for identifying as transgender is essential, he said in an interview, especially when it comes to young people.

“There may be other reasons for doing it, and we need to look for those, identify them and treat them. This needs to be done before initiating hormones and changing the whole physical nature of the child,” he said.

“A cautious psychotherapy-first approach makes sense. If we can do that with adolescents, then we will take a big step in the right direction,” stressed Dr. Morris, who is president of the National Association of Practising Psychiatrists in Australia.
 

Keira Bell case and Scandinavian stance lead to more open discussion

The rapid rise in gender dysphoria among adolescents in the Western world, referred to as “rapid-onset” or “late-onset” gender dysphoria, has seen a huge increase in the number of natal girls presenting and created frenzied debate that has intensified worldwide in the last 12 months about how to best treat youth with gender dysphoria.

Concerns have arisen that some transgender identification is due to social contagion, and there is a growing number of “detransitioners” – people who identified as transgender, transitioned to the opposite gender, but then regretted their decision, changed their minds, and “detransitioned” back to their birth sex. If they have had hormone therapy, and in some cases surgery, they are left with irreversible changes to their bodies.

As a result, Scandinavian countries, most notably Finland, once eager advocates of the gender-affirmative approach, have pulled back and issued new treatment guidelines in 2020 stating that psychotherapy, rather than gender reassignment, should be the first line of treatment for gender-dysphoric youth.

This, along with a landmark High Court decision in the U.K. regarding the use of puberty-blocking drugs for children with gender dysphoria, brought by detransitioner Keira Bell, which was recently overturned by the Appeal Court, but which Ms. Bell now says she will take to the Supreme Court, has led to a considerable shift in the conversation around treating transgender adolescents with hormonal therapy, says Dr. Morris.

“This [has moved from] ... a topic that could previously not be talked about freely to one that we can discuss more openly now. This is a big improvement. Previously, everyone thought it was all settled, but it’s not, certainly not from a medical angle,” he states.
 

At odds with prior Australian recommendations

The RANZCP had previously endorsed the standard guidelines of the Royal Children’s Hospital (RCH) Melbourne, followed by most gender-identity services in Australia and similar guidance from New Zealand, which both recommend gender-affirming care.

“Increasing evidence demonstrates that with supportive, gender-affirming care during childhood and adolescence, harms can be ameliorated and mental health and well-being outcomes can be significantly improved,” state the RCH guidelines.

But in 2019, RANZCP removed its endorsement of the RCH guidelines and started a consultation, which resulted in the new position statement.

However, Ken Pang, MD, of the Murdoch Children’s Research Institute in Melbourne and an author of the RCH guidelines, says the key recommendations of the new RANZCP position statement are consistent with their own guidelines.

The former note “the need for a skilled mental health clinician in providing comprehensive exploration of a child or adolescent’s biopsychosocial context,” Dr. Pang says.

However, it’s difficult not to see the contrast in stance when the new RANZCP statement maintains: “Research on gender dysphoria is still emerging. There are polarized views and mixed evidence regarding treatment options for people presenting with gender identity concerns, especially children and young people.”

Dr. Pang says the RCH guidelines do, however, recognize the need for further research in the field.

“I look forward to being able to incorporate such research, including from our own Trans20 study, into future revisions of our guidelines,” he told this news organization.
 

Watch your backs with affirmative therapy: Will there be a compromise?

Dr. Morris says there will obviously be cases where “the child might transition with a medical intervention, but that wouldn’t be the first step.”

And yet, he adds, “There are those who push the pro-trans view that everyone should be allowed to transition, and the doctors are only technicians that provide hormones with no questions asked.” 

But from a doctor’s perspective, clinicians will still be held responsible in medical and legal terms for the treatments given, he stressed.

“I don’t think they will ever not be accountable for that. They will always need to determine in their own mind whether their actions have positive value that outweigh any disadvantages,” Dr. Morris continues.

The RANZCP statement does, in fact, stress just this.

All health care professionals need to “be aware of ethical and medicolegal dilemmas” pertaining to affirmative therapy, it indicates. “Psychiatrists should practice within the relevant laws and accepted professional standards in relation to assessing capacity and obtaining consent...”

Dr. Morris hopes there will ultimately be many more checks and balances in place and that courts and clinicians will need to step back and not assume every child who seeks to transition is doing it as a result of pure gender dysphoria.

He predicts that things will end in a compromise. 

“In my view, this compromise will treat children with respect and approach them like any other patient that presents with a condition that requires proper assessment and treatment.”

“In the end, some cases will be transitioned, but there will be fewer than [are] transitioned at the moment,” he predicts.

Dr. Morris has reported no relevant financial relationships. Dr. Pang is a member of the Australian Professional Association for Trans Health and its research committee.

A version of this article first appeared on Medscape.com.

After nearly a decade, the American Academy of Orthopaedic Surgeons has updated its guidance on nonoperative treatment for knee osteoarthritis.

The clinical practice guidelines, released Sept. 13, 2021, is the third edition of the orthopedic society’s clinical practice recommendations.

According to Robert Brophy, MD, FAAOS, an orthopedic surgeon at Washington University, St. Louis, and cochair of the AAOS clinical practice guideline work group, the AAOS guidelines are a “living document” that needs periodic updating as new research comes to light.

“The methodology for maintaining the AAOS guidelines aims to update guideline documents at least every 10 years,” Dr. Brophy said in an interview. “Since the last edition was from 2013, it was time to provide an updated guideline on this very important topic that affects such a high percentage of our patients and providers.”

The guidelines work group, composed of 12 medical doctors and 1 physical therapist, evaluated the evidence for 29 areas of treatment.

A rating scale based on available evidence and the strength of related medical studies labeled each treatment area as demonstrating strong, moderate, or limited evidence.

Eight treatment modalities weighed in with strong evidence for or against their use: lateral wedge insoles, topical or oral NSAIDs, exercise (supervised or unsupervised), self-management programs, patient education programs, oral acetaminophen, and oral opioids.

According to Dr. Brophy, many of the recommendations assigned a strong evidence base were similar to the prior edition of the guidelines.
 

Oral medications

NSAIDs and acetaminophen still remain steadfast options for the treatment of knee pain secondary to OA.

decade3d/Thinkstock

The most notable change was that opioids, which have a long history of being used to treat pain, are strongly recommended not to be used for arthritis.

“Reflecting the growing awareness of and emphasis on the opioid epidemic, one of the strongest changes between the current and prior guidelines centers on the use of opioid medications,” Dr. Brophy said. “In the prior guideline, a strong recommendation was made in favor of tramadol with an inconclusive recommendation made regarding other opioid medications. The updated guideline demonstrates clearly the evidence does not support the use of opioid medications – including tramadol – to treat knee osteoarthritis.”

This may require some education for both patients and doctors to buy in that knee pain can be treated adequately with NSAIDs and acetaminophen.

Patients may not understand that anti-inflammatory drugs treat the pain they are experiencing. They may equate an opioid with a “pain pill” and may need education from their doctor that NSAIDs and acetaminophen not only can relieve their pain, but also avoid potential adverse events prior to or after surgery should they progress to knee replacement surgery.

Furthermore, primary care physicians may not be looking at the long-term picture. Solving a short-term pain problem with opioids may limit the medication’s ability to provide pain relief after surgery should a patient develop a tolerance to the medication’s effects.
 

Recommendations on hip and foot alignment interventions

When it comes to alignment and joint stresses, the knee is sometimes considered the innocent bystander of hip and foot alignment.

Insoles. How the hip and foot align with each can determine the amount of weight that passes through the medial (inner) or lateral (outer) compartment of the knee. To that end, lateral foot insoles have been used in the past for unloading parts of the knee.

Nevertheless, recent evidence has failed to demonstrate a significant benefit for insoles in the setting of OA knee pain, earning the practice a strong recommendation against its use.

High-tibial osteotomy (HTO). The weight-bearing axis of the lower-extremity axis can also be realigned with HTO. The procedure shifts the body’s weight slightly to the opposite side of the knee.

Newer research has led the practice to be downgraded one level in the new guideline, from moderate to limited, despite its widespread use.

It will, however, likely continue to be used as an alternative to total knee replacement in younger patients and to shift weight away from an area of the knee where cartilage is being restored with a concomitant surgical procedure, according to the work group. They noted that additional research studies on the long-term efficacy of the procedure are still needed.

Topical treatments. The guideline authors gave these a strong recommendation. Gels with anti-inflammatory medication have long been available but were prescription only or of considerable cost. Now several affordable over-the-counter options with the same prescription strength can be found in pharmacies and supermarkets.

What makes these medications unique is that they have an NSAID medication in the formulation, which the vast majority of topical treatments found on shelves do not. They also benefit patients who are unable to tolerate oral NSAIDs because of gastrointestinal side effects.

Comparison with 2019 OARSI recommendations

In 2019, the Osteoarthritis Research Society International also published guidelines for the management of OA of the hand, hip, and knee.

Thomas Trojian, MD, a family medicine physician with expertise in sports medicine in York, Pa., and member of both the AAOS and OARSI recommendation committees, noted that the OARSI guidelines are meant to be practical guidelines of stepwise nonoperative treatment.

He said in an interview that “the OARSI guidelines recommend dietary weight management, education, and land-based [exercise] therapy, next topical NSAIDs, then injection therapy.”

Intra-articular steroids and viscosupplementation injection therapy in the form of hyaluronic acid derivatives continue to be a mainstay of treatment for both groups.

The AAOS group notably gave a moderate strength recommendation for intra-articular steroid injections with the caveat that the effects typically only last for 3 months. They also included newer extended-release steroid injections in the recommendation, stating that the evidence moderately suggests they provide more benefit than traditional short-acting steroid injections.
 

Methodology differs between guidelines

In the areas where the guidelines don’t fully line up, it is important to remember the methodology of each group often drives the guidelines and recommendations.

According to Yale Fillingham, MD, an orthopedic surgeon in group private practice in the greater Philadelphia area and the other cochair of the AAOS guidelines committee, the biggest difference between the AAOS and OARSI guidelines is that, although the OARSI guidelines are also grounded in the literature, the recommendation level was based on voting among panel members.

“The AAOS methodology requires the recommendation and strength of the recommendation to be dictated primarily by the best available evidence in the literature and much less on the expertise and opinion of the voting panel,” Dr. Fillingham said in an interview.

He pointed out that the AAOS voting panel can alter the guideline by adjusting the strength of the recommendation but noted it was only in very clearly defined situations. Therefore, the differences in methodology between the groups make it difficult to directly compare the two guidelines.

Multiple guidelines do, however, point to the importance of the issue. Dr. Fillingham commented: “The numerous organizations that have produced guidelines on the treatment of knee osteoarthritis are a testament to the widespread and profound impact of knee osteoarthritis on our health care system and society.”

As a member of both recommendation groups, Dr. Trojian finds both guidelines reveal the importance of understanding that knee OA is a chronic illness. “There are ways we can manage knee OA and reduce the morbidity. ... The core skills of motivational interviewing are important. Open-ended questions, affirmation, reflection, and summarizing are needed to help patients find and remove roadblocks to promote lifestyle changes.”

Dr. Brophy, Dr. Trojian, and Dr. Fillingham have disclosed no relevant financial relationships.

A version of this article first appeared on Medscape.com.

After nearly a decade, the American Academy of Orthopaedic Surgeons has updated its guidance on nonoperative treatment for knee osteoarthritis.

The clinical practice guidelines, released Sept. 13, 2021, is the third edition of the orthopedic society’s clinical practice recommendations.

According to Robert Brophy, MD, FAAOS, an orthopedic surgeon at Washington University, St. Louis, and cochair of the AAOS clinical practice guideline work group, the AAOS guidelines are a “living document” that needs periodic updating as new research comes to light.

“The methodology for maintaining the AAOS guidelines aims to update guideline documents at least every 10 years,” Dr. Brophy said in an interview. “Since the last edition was from 2013, it was time to provide an updated guideline on this very important topic that affects such a high percentage of our patients and providers.”

The guidelines work group, composed of 12 medical doctors and 1 physical therapist, evaluated the evidence for 29 areas of treatment.

A rating scale based on available evidence and the strength of related medical studies labeled each treatment area as demonstrating strong, moderate, or limited evidence.

Eight treatment modalities weighed in with strong evidence for or against their use: lateral wedge insoles, topical or oral NSAIDs, exercise (supervised or unsupervised), self-management programs, patient education programs, oral acetaminophen, and oral opioids.

According to Dr. Brophy, many of the recommendations assigned a strong evidence base were similar to the prior edition of the guidelines.
 

Oral medications

NSAIDs and acetaminophen still remain steadfast options for the treatment of knee pain secondary to OA.

decade3d/Thinkstock

The most notable change was that opioids, which have a long history of being used to treat pain, are strongly recommended not to be used for arthritis.

“Reflecting the growing awareness of and emphasis on the opioid epidemic, one of the strongest changes between the current and prior guidelines centers on the use of opioid medications,” Dr. Brophy said. “In the prior guideline, a strong recommendation was made in favor of tramadol with an inconclusive recommendation made regarding other opioid medications. The updated guideline demonstrates clearly the evidence does not support the use of opioid medications – including tramadol – to treat knee osteoarthritis.”

This may require some education for both patients and doctors to buy in that knee pain can be treated adequately with NSAIDs and acetaminophen.

Patients may not understand that anti-inflammatory drugs treat the pain they are experiencing. They may equate an opioid with a “pain pill” and may need education from their doctor that NSAIDs and acetaminophen not only can relieve their pain, but also avoid potential adverse events prior to or after surgery should they progress to knee replacement surgery.

Furthermore, primary care physicians may not be looking at the long-term picture. Solving a short-term pain problem with opioids may limit the medication’s ability to provide pain relief after surgery should a patient develop a tolerance to the medication’s effects.
 

Recommendations on hip and foot alignment interventions

When it comes to alignment and joint stresses, the knee is sometimes considered the innocent bystander of hip and foot alignment.

Insoles. How the hip and foot align with each can determine the amount of weight that passes through the medial (inner) or lateral (outer) compartment of the knee. To that end, lateral foot insoles have been used in the past for unloading parts of the knee.

Nevertheless, recent evidence has failed to demonstrate a significant benefit for insoles in the setting of OA knee pain, earning the practice a strong recommendation against its use.

High-tibial osteotomy (HTO). The weight-bearing axis of the lower-extremity axis can also be realigned with HTO. The procedure shifts the body’s weight slightly to the opposite side of the knee.

Newer research has led the practice to be downgraded one level in the new guideline, from moderate to limited, despite its widespread use.

It will, however, likely continue to be used as an alternative to total knee replacement in younger patients and to shift weight away from an area of the knee where cartilage is being restored with a concomitant surgical procedure, according to the work group. They noted that additional research studies on the long-term efficacy of the procedure are still needed.

Topical treatments. The guideline authors gave these a strong recommendation. Gels with anti-inflammatory medication have long been available but were prescription only or of considerable cost. Now several affordable over-the-counter options with the same prescription strength can be found in pharmacies and supermarkets.

What makes these medications unique is that they have an NSAID medication in the formulation, which the vast majority of topical treatments found on shelves do not. They also benefit patients who are unable to tolerate oral NSAIDs because of gastrointestinal side effects.

Comparison with 2019 OARSI recommendations

In 2019, the Osteoarthritis Research Society International also published guidelines for the management of OA of the hand, hip, and knee.

Thomas Trojian, MD, a family medicine physician with expertise in sports medicine in York, Pa., and member of both the AAOS and OARSI recommendation committees, noted that the OARSI guidelines are meant to be practical guidelines of stepwise nonoperative treatment.

He said in an interview that “the OARSI guidelines recommend dietary weight management, education, and land-based [exercise] therapy, next topical NSAIDs, then injection therapy.”

Intra-articular steroids and viscosupplementation injection therapy in the form of hyaluronic acid derivatives continue to be a mainstay of treatment for both groups.

The AAOS group notably gave a moderate strength recommendation for intra-articular steroid injections with the caveat that the effects typically only last for 3 months. They also included newer extended-release steroid injections in the recommendation, stating that the evidence moderately suggests they provide more benefit than traditional short-acting steroid injections.
 

Methodology differs between guidelines

In the areas where the guidelines don’t fully line up, it is important to remember the methodology of each group often drives the guidelines and recommendations.

According to Yale Fillingham, MD, an orthopedic surgeon in group private practice in the greater Philadelphia area and the other cochair of the AAOS guidelines committee, the biggest difference between the AAOS and OARSI guidelines is that, although the OARSI guidelines are also grounded in the literature, the recommendation level was based on voting among panel members.

“The AAOS methodology requires the recommendation and strength of the recommendation to be dictated primarily by the best available evidence in the literature and much less on the expertise and opinion of the voting panel,” Dr. Fillingham said in an interview.

He pointed out that the AAOS voting panel can alter the guideline by adjusting the strength of the recommendation but noted it was only in very clearly defined situations. Therefore, the differences in methodology between the groups make it difficult to directly compare the two guidelines.

Multiple guidelines do, however, point to the importance of the issue. Dr. Fillingham commented: “The numerous organizations that have produced guidelines on the treatment of knee osteoarthritis are a testament to the widespread and profound impact of knee osteoarthritis on our health care system and society.”

As a member of both recommendation groups, Dr. Trojian finds both guidelines reveal the importance of understanding that knee OA is a chronic illness. “There are ways we can manage knee OA and reduce the morbidity. ... The core skills of motivational interviewing are important. Open-ended questions, affirmation, reflection, and summarizing are needed to help patients find and remove roadblocks to promote lifestyle changes.”

Dr. Brophy, Dr. Trojian, and Dr. Fillingham have disclosed no relevant financial relationships.

A version of this article first appeared on Medscape.com.

After nearly a decade, the American Academy of Orthopaedic Surgeons has updated its guidance on nonoperative treatment for knee osteoarthritis.

The clinical practice guidelines, released Sept. 13, 2021, is the third edition of the orthopedic society’s clinical practice recommendations.

According to Robert Brophy, MD, FAAOS, an orthopedic surgeon at Washington University, St. Louis, and cochair of the AAOS clinical practice guideline work group, the AAOS guidelines are a “living document” that needs periodic updating as new research comes to light.

“The methodology for maintaining the AAOS guidelines aims to update guideline documents at least every 10 years,” Dr. Brophy said in an interview. “Since the last edition was from 2013, it was time to provide an updated guideline on this very important topic that affects such a high percentage of our patients and providers.”

The guidelines work group, composed of 12 medical doctors and 1 physical therapist, evaluated the evidence for 29 areas of treatment.

A rating scale based on available evidence and the strength of related medical studies labeled each treatment area as demonstrating strong, moderate, or limited evidence.

Eight treatment modalities weighed in with strong evidence for or against their use: lateral wedge insoles, topical or oral NSAIDs, exercise (supervised or unsupervised), self-management programs, patient education programs, oral acetaminophen, and oral opioids.

According to Dr. Brophy, many of the recommendations assigned a strong evidence base were similar to the prior edition of the guidelines.
 

Oral medications

NSAIDs and acetaminophen still remain steadfast options for the treatment of knee pain secondary to OA.

decade3d/Thinkstock

The most notable change was that opioids, which have a long history of being used to treat pain, are strongly recommended not to be used for arthritis.

“Reflecting the growing awareness of and emphasis on the opioid epidemic, one of the strongest changes between the current and prior guidelines centers on the use of opioid medications,” Dr. Brophy said. “In the prior guideline, a strong recommendation was made in favor of tramadol with an inconclusive recommendation made regarding other opioid medications. The updated guideline demonstrates clearly the evidence does not support the use of opioid medications – including tramadol – to treat knee osteoarthritis.”

This may require some education for both patients and doctors to buy in that knee pain can be treated adequately with NSAIDs and acetaminophen.

Patients may not understand that anti-inflammatory drugs treat the pain they are experiencing. They may equate an opioid with a “pain pill” and may need education from their doctor that NSAIDs and acetaminophen not only can relieve their pain, but also avoid potential adverse events prior to or after surgery should they progress to knee replacement surgery.

Furthermore, primary care physicians may not be looking at the long-term picture. Solving a short-term pain problem with opioids may limit the medication’s ability to provide pain relief after surgery should a patient develop a tolerance to the medication’s effects.
 

Recommendations on hip and foot alignment interventions

When it comes to alignment and joint stresses, the knee is sometimes considered the innocent bystander of hip and foot alignment.

Insoles. How the hip and foot align with each can determine the amount of weight that passes through the medial (inner) or lateral (outer) compartment of the knee. To that end, lateral foot insoles have been used in the past for unloading parts of the knee.

Nevertheless, recent evidence has failed to demonstrate a significant benefit for insoles in the setting of OA knee pain, earning the practice a strong recommendation against its use.

High-tibial osteotomy (HTO). The weight-bearing axis of the lower-extremity axis can also be realigned with HTO. The procedure shifts the body’s weight slightly to the opposite side of the knee.

Newer research has led the practice to be downgraded one level in the new guideline, from moderate to limited, despite its widespread use.

It will, however, likely continue to be used as an alternative to total knee replacement in younger patients and to shift weight away from an area of the knee where cartilage is being restored with a concomitant surgical procedure, according to the work group. They noted that additional research studies on the long-term efficacy of the procedure are still needed.

Topical treatments. The guideline authors gave these a strong recommendation. Gels with anti-inflammatory medication have long been available but were prescription only or of considerable cost. Now several affordable over-the-counter options with the same prescription strength can be found in pharmacies and supermarkets.

What makes these medications unique is that they have an NSAID medication in the formulation, which the vast majority of topical treatments found on shelves do not. They also benefit patients who are unable to tolerate oral NSAIDs because of gastrointestinal side effects.

Comparison with 2019 OARSI recommendations

In 2019, the Osteoarthritis Research Society International also published guidelines for the management of OA of the hand, hip, and knee.

Thomas Trojian, MD, a family medicine physician with expertise in sports medicine in York, Pa., and member of both the AAOS and OARSI recommendation committees, noted that the OARSI guidelines are meant to be practical guidelines of stepwise nonoperative treatment.

He said in an interview that “the OARSI guidelines recommend dietary weight management, education, and land-based [exercise] therapy, next topical NSAIDs, then injection therapy.”

Intra-articular steroids and viscosupplementation injection therapy in the form of hyaluronic acid derivatives continue to be a mainstay of treatment for both groups.

The AAOS group notably gave a moderate strength recommendation for intra-articular steroid injections with the caveat that the effects typically only last for 3 months. They also included newer extended-release steroid injections in the recommendation, stating that the evidence moderately suggests they provide more benefit than traditional short-acting steroid injections.
 

Methodology differs between guidelines

In the areas where the guidelines don’t fully line up, it is important to remember the methodology of each group often drives the guidelines and recommendations.

According to Yale Fillingham, MD, an orthopedic surgeon in group private practice in the greater Philadelphia area and the other cochair of the AAOS guidelines committee, the biggest difference between the AAOS and OARSI guidelines is that, although the OARSI guidelines are also grounded in the literature, the recommendation level was based on voting among panel members.

“The AAOS methodology requires the recommendation and strength of the recommendation to be dictated primarily by the best available evidence in the literature and much less on the expertise and opinion of the voting panel,” Dr. Fillingham said in an interview.

He pointed out that the AAOS voting panel can alter the guideline by adjusting the strength of the recommendation but noted it was only in very clearly defined situations. Therefore, the differences in methodology between the groups make it difficult to directly compare the two guidelines.

Multiple guidelines do, however, point to the importance of the issue. Dr. Fillingham commented: “The numerous organizations that have produced guidelines on the treatment of knee osteoarthritis are a testament to the widespread and profound impact of knee osteoarthritis on our health care system and society.”

As a member of both recommendation groups, Dr. Trojian finds both guidelines reveal the importance of understanding that knee OA is a chronic illness. “There are ways we can manage knee OA and reduce the morbidity. ... The core skills of motivational interviewing are important. Open-ended questions, affirmation, reflection, and summarizing are needed to help patients find and remove roadblocks to promote lifestyle changes.”

Dr. Brophy, Dr. Trojian, and Dr. Fillingham have disclosed no relevant financial relationships.

A version of this article first appeared on Medscape.com.

Sexually transmitted infection rates have not increased as dramatically in older women as they have in women in their teens and 20s, but rates of chlamydia and gonorrhea in women over age 35 have seen a steady incline over the past decade, and syphilis rates have climbed steeply, according to data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

That makes the STI treatment guidelines released by the CDC in July even timelier for practitioners of menopause medicine, according to Michael S. Policar, MD, MPH, a professor emeritus of ob.gyn. and reproductive sciences at the University of California, San Francisco.

Dr. Policar discussed what clinicians need to know about STIs in midlife women at the hybrid annual meeting of the North American Menopause Society. Even the nomenclature change in the guidelines from “sexually transmitted diseases” to “sexually transmitted infections” is important “because they want to acknowledge the fact that a lot of the sexually transmitted infections that we’re treating are asymptomatic, are colonizations, and are not yet diseases,” Dr. Policar said. “We’re trying to be much more expansive in thinking about finding these infections before they actually start causing morbidity in the form of a disease.”
 

Sexual history

The primary guidelines update for taking sexual history is the recommendation to ask patients about their intentions regarding pregnancy. The “5 Ps” of sexual history are now Partners, Practices, Protection from STIs, Past history of STIs, and Pregnancy intention.

“There should be a sixth P that has to do with pleasure questions,” Policar added. “We ask all the time for patients that we see in the context of perimenopausal and menopausal services, ‘Are you satisfied with your sexual relationship with your partner?’ Hopefully that will make it into the CDC guidelines as the sixth P at some point, but for now, that’s aspirational.”

In asking about partners, instead of asking patients whether they have sex with men, women, or both, clinicians should ask first if the patient is having sex of any kind – oral, vaginal, or anal – with anyone. From there, providers should ask how many sex partners the patient has had, the gender(s) of the partners, and whether they or their partners have other sex partners, using more gender-inclusive language.

When asking about practices, in addition to asking about the type of sexual contact patients have had, additional questions include whether the patient met their partners online or through apps, whether they or any of their partners use drugs, and whether the patient has exchanged sex for any needs, such as money, housing, or drugs. The additional questions can identify those at higher risk for STIs.

After reviewing the CDC’s list of risk factors for gonorrhea and chlamydia screening, Dr. Policar shared the screening list from the California Department of Public Health, which he finds more helpful:

• History of gonorrhea, chlamydia, or pelvic inflammatory disease (PID) in the past 2 years.
• More than 1 sexual partner in the past year.
• New sexual partner within 90 days.
• Reason to believe that a sex partner has had other partners in the past year.
• Exchanging sex for drugs or money within the past year.
• Other factors identified locally, including prevalence of infection in the community.

STI screening guidelines

For those with a positive gonorrhea/chlamydia (GC/CT) screen, a nucleic acid amplification test (NAAT) vaginal swab is the preferred specimen source, and self-collection is fine for women of any age, Dr. Policar said. In addition, cis-women who received anal intercourse in the preceding year should consider undergoing a rectal GC/CT NAAT, and those who performed oral sex should consider a pharyngeal GC/CT NAAT, based on shared clinical decision-making. A rectal swab requires an insertion of 3-4 cm and a 360-degree twirl of the wrist, not the swab, to ensure you get a sample from the entire circumference. Pharyngeal samples require swabbing both tonsillar pillars while taking care for those who may gag.

For contact testing – asymptomatic people who have had a high-risk sexual exposure – providers should test for gonorrhea, chlamydia, HIV, and syphilis but not for herpes, high-risk HPV, hepatitis B, hepatitis C, or bacterial vaginosis. “Maybe we’ll do a screen for trichomoniasis, and maybe we’ll offer herpes type 2 serology or antibody screening,” Dr. Policar said. Providers should also ask patients requesting contact testing if they have been vaccinated for hepatitis B. If not, “the conversation should be how can we get you vaccinated for hepatitis B,” Dr. Policar said.

HIV screening only needs to occur once between the ages of 15 and 65 for low-risk people and then once annually (or more often if necessary) for those who have a sex partner with HIV, use injectable drugs, engage in commercial sex work, have a new sex partner with unknown HIV status, received care at an STD or TB clinic, or were in a correctional facility or homeless shelter.

Those at increased risk for syphilis include men who have sex with men, men under age 29, and anyone living with HIV or who has a history of incarceration or a history of commercial sex work. In addition, African Americans have the greatest risk for syphilis of racial/ethnic groups, followed by Hispanics. Most adults only require hepatitis C screening with anti-hep C antibody testing once in their lifetime. Periodic hepatitis C screening should occur for people who inject drugs. If the screening is positive, providers should conduct an RNA polymerase chain reaction (PCR) test to determine whether a chronic infection is present.

Trichomoniasis screening should occur annually in women living with HIV or in correctional facilities. Others to consider screening include people with new or multiple sex partners, a history of STIs, inconsistent condom use, a history of sex work, and intravenous drug use. Dr. Policar also noted that several new assays, including NAAT, PCR, and a rapid test, are available for trichomoniasis.
 

STI treatment guidelines

For women with mucoprurulent cervicitis, the cause could be chlamydia, gonorrhea, herpes, trichomonas, mycoplasma, or even progesterone from pregnancy or contraception, Dr. Policar said. The new preferred treatment is 100 mg of doxycycline. The alternative, albeit less preferred, treatment is 1 g azithromycin.

The preferred treatment for chlamydia is now 100 mg oral doxycycline twice daily, or doxycycline 200 mg delayed-release once daily, for 7 days. Alternative regimens include 1 g oral azithromycin in a single dose or 500 mg oral levofloxacin once daily for 7 days. The switch to recommending doxycycline over azithromycin is based on recent evidence showing that doxycycline has a slightly higher efficacy for urogenital chlamydia and a substantially higher efficacy for rectal chlamydia. In addition, an increasing proportion of gonorrheal infections have shown resistance to azithromycin, particularly beginning in 2014.

Preferred treatment of new, uncomplicated gonorrhea infections of the cervix, urethra, rectum, and pharynx is one 500-mg dose of ceftriaxone for those weighing under 150 kg and 1 g for those weighing 150 kg or more. If ceftriaxone is unavailable, the new alternative recommended treatment for gonorrhea is 800 mg cefixime. For pharyngeal gonorrhea only, the CDC recommends a test-of-cure 7-14 days after treatment.

For gonorrheal infections, the CDC also recommends treatment with doxycycline if chlamydia has not been excluded, but the agency no longer recommends dual therapy with azithromycin unless it’s used in place of doxycycline for those who are pregnant, have an allergy, or may not be compliant with a 7-day doxycycline regimen.

The preferred treatment for bacterial vaginosis has not changed. The new recommended regimen for trichomoniasis is 500 mg oral metronidazole for 7 days, with the alternative being a single 2-g dose of tinidazole. Male partners should receive 2 g oral metronidazole. The CDC also notes that patients taking metronidazole no longer need to abstain from alcohol during treatment.

”Another area where the guidelines changed is in their description of expedited partner therapy, which means that, when we find an index case who has gonorrhea or chlamydia, we always have a discussion with her about getting her partners treated,” Dr. Policar said. “The CDC was quite clear that the responsibility for discussing partner treatment rests with us as the diagnosing provider” since city and county health departments don’t have the time or resources for contact tracing these STIs.

The two main ways to treat partners are to have the patient bring their partner(s) to the appointment with them or to do patient-delivered partner therapy. Ideally, clinicians who dispense their own medications can give the patient enough drugs to give her partner(s) a complete dose as well. Otherwise, providers can prescribe extra doses in the index patients’ name or write prescriptions in the partner’s name.

“In every state of the union now, it is legal for you to to prescribe antibiotics for partners sight unseen, Dr. Policar said.

Margaret Sullivan, MD, an ob.gyn. from rural western North Carolina, noted during the Q&A that an obstacle to partner therapy at her practice has been cost, particularly since many of the men don’t have insurance.

“I have not heard before of prescribing the extra doses for partners under the patient’s name,” Dr. Sullivan said. “I’ve thought about doing it, but [was worried about] it potentially being fraudulent if that patient has Medicaid and we’re prescribing extra doses under her name, so how do you work around that?”

Dr. Policar acknowledged that barrier and recommended that patients use the website/app Goodrx.com to find discounts for out-of-pocket generic medications. He also noted the occasional obstacle of pharmacists balking at filling a double or triple dose.

“What we’ve been suggesting in that circumstance is to literally copy that part of the CDC guidelines, which explains expedited partner therapy or patient-delivered partner therapy and send that off to the pharmacist so they can see that it’s a national recommendation of the CDC,” Dr. Policar said.

Claudia Rodriguez, MD, an ob.gyn. who works at Sherman Hospital in Elgin, Ill., asked about the CDC recommendations for HPV vaccination in older women. Although the CDC permits women over age 26 to receive the HPV vaccine, the agency does not “make a solid recommendation to have this done, which oftentimes makes a big difference in whether or not health insurance will actually pay for vaccination in that circumstance,” Dr. Policar said.

Patients are welcome to request the vaccine after shared decision-making, but “we should never present this as something which is routine,” he said. For women in their 50s, for example, “there’s virtually no data about any additional degree of protection that you would get” from HPV vaccination, Dr. Policar said in response to a similar question from Tara Allmen, MD, an ob.gyn. in New York City. “If you ask me for my personal clinical opinion about it, I would say it’s not going to be worth it,” he said.

Dr Policar had no disclosures. Disclosures were unavailable for attendees who spoke.

Sexually transmitted infection rates have not increased as dramatically in older women as they have in women in their teens and 20s, but rates of chlamydia and gonorrhea in women over age 35 have seen a steady incline over the past decade, and syphilis rates have climbed steeply, according to data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

That makes the STI treatment guidelines released by the CDC in July even timelier for practitioners of menopause medicine, according to Michael S. Policar, MD, MPH, a professor emeritus of ob.gyn. and reproductive sciences at the University of California, San Francisco.

Dr. Policar discussed what clinicians need to know about STIs in midlife women at the hybrid annual meeting of the North American Menopause Society. Even the nomenclature change in the guidelines from “sexually transmitted diseases” to “sexually transmitted infections” is important “because they want to acknowledge the fact that a lot of the sexually transmitted infections that we’re treating are asymptomatic, are colonizations, and are not yet diseases,” Dr. Policar said. “We’re trying to be much more expansive in thinking about finding these infections before they actually start causing morbidity in the form of a disease.”
 

Sexual history

The primary guidelines update for taking sexual history is the recommendation to ask patients about their intentions regarding pregnancy. The “5 Ps” of sexual history are now Partners, Practices, Protection from STIs, Past history of STIs, and Pregnancy intention.

“There should be a sixth P that has to do with pleasure questions,” Policar added. “We ask all the time for patients that we see in the context of perimenopausal and menopausal services, ‘Are you satisfied with your sexual relationship with your partner?’ Hopefully that will make it into the CDC guidelines as the sixth P at some point, but for now, that’s aspirational.”

In asking about partners, instead of asking patients whether they have sex with men, women, or both, clinicians should ask first if the patient is having sex of any kind – oral, vaginal, or anal – with anyone. From there, providers should ask how many sex partners the patient has had, the gender(s) of the partners, and whether they or their partners have other sex partners, using more gender-inclusive language.

When asking about practices, in addition to asking about the type of sexual contact patients have had, additional questions include whether the patient met their partners online or through apps, whether they or any of their partners use drugs, and whether the patient has exchanged sex for any needs, such as money, housing, or drugs. The additional questions can identify those at higher risk for STIs.

After reviewing the CDC’s list of risk factors for gonorrhea and chlamydia screening, Dr. Policar shared the screening list from the California Department of Public Health, which he finds more helpful:

• History of gonorrhea, chlamydia, or pelvic inflammatory disease (PID) in the past 2 years.
• More than 1 sexual partner in the past year.
• New sexual partner within 90 days.
• Reason to believe that a sex partner has had other partners in the past year.
• Exchanging sex for drugs or money within the past year.
• Other factors identified locally, including prevalence of infection in the community.

STI screening guidelines

For those with a positive gonorrhea/chlamydia (GC/CT) screen, a nucleic acid amplification test (NAAT) vaginal swab is the preferred specimen source, and self-collection is fine for women of any age, Dr. Policar said. In addition, cis-women who received anal intercourse in the preceding year should consider undergoing a rectal GC/CT NAAT, and those who performed oral sex should consider a pharyngeal GC/CT NAAT, based on shared clinical decision-making. A rectal swab requires an insertion of 3-4 cm and a 360-degree twirl of the wrist, not the swab, to ensure you get a sample from the entire circumference. Pharyngeal samples require swabbing both tonsillar pillars while taking care for those who may gag.

For contact testing – asymptomatic people who have had a high-risk sexual exposure – providers should test for gonorrhea, chlamydia, HIV, and syphilis but not for herpes, high-risk HPV, hepatitis B, hepatitis C, or bacterial vaginosis. “Maybe we’ll do a screen for trichomoniasis, and maybe we’ll offer herpes type 2 serology or antibody screening,” Dr. Policar said. Providers should also ask patients requesting contact testing if they have been vaccinated for hepatitis B. If not, “the conversation should be how can we get you vaccinated for hepatitis B,” Dr. Policar said.

HIV screening only needs to occur once between the ages of 15 and 65 for low-risk people and then once annually (or more often if necessary) for those who have a sex partner with HIV, use injectable drugs, engage in commercial sex work, have a new sex partner with unknown HIV status, received care at an STD or TB clinic, or were in a correctional facility or homeless shelter.

Those at increased risk for syphilis include men who have sex with men, men under age 29, and anyone living with HIV or who has a history of incarceration or a history of commercial sex work. In addition, African Americans have the greatest risk for syphilis of racial/ethnic groups, followed by Hispanics. Most adults only require hepatitis C screening with anti-hep C antibody testing once in their lifetime. Periodic hepatitis C screening should occur for people who inject drugs. If the screening is positive, providers should conduct an RNA polymerase chain reaction (PCR) test to determine whether a chronic infection is present.

Trichomoniasis screening should occur annually in women living with HIV or in correctional facilities. Others to consider screening include people with new or multiple sex partners, a history of STIs, inconsistent condom use, a history of sex work, and intravenous drug use. Dr. Policar also noted that several new assays, including NAAT, PCR, and a rapid test, are available for trichomoniasis.
 

STI treatment guidelines

For women with mucoprurulent cervicitis, the cause could be chlamydia, gonorrhea, herpes, trichomonas, mycoplasma, or even progesterone from pregnancy or contraception, Dr. Policar said. The new preferred treatment is 100 mg of doxycycline. The alternative, albeit less preferred, treatment is 1 g azithromycin.

The preferred treatment for chlamydia is now 100 mg oral doxycycline twice daily, or doxycycline 200 mg delayed-release once daily, for 7 days. Alternative regimens include 1 g oral azithromycin in a single dose or 500 mg oral levofloxacin once daily for 7 days. The switch to recommending doxycycline over azithromycin is based on recent evidence showing that doxycycline has a slightly higher efficacy for urogenital chlamydia and a substantially higher efficacy for rectal chlamydia. In addition, an increasing proportion of gonorrheal infections have shown resistance to azithromycin, particularly beginning in 2014.

Preferred treatment of new, uncomplicated gonorrhea infections of the cervix, urethra, rectum, and pharynx is one 500-mg dose of ceftriaxone for those weighing under 150 kg and 1 g for those weighing 150 kg or more. If ceftriaxone is unavailable, the new alternative recommended treatment for gonorrhea is 800 mg cefixime. For pharyngeal gonorrhea only, the CDC recommends a test-of-cure 7-14 days after treatment.

For gonorrheal infections, the CDC also recommends treatment with doxycycline if chlamydia has not been excluded, but the agency no longer recommends dual therapy with azithromycin unless it’s used in place of doxycycline for those who are pregnant, have an allergy, or may not be compliant with a 7-day doxycycline regimen.

The preferred treatment for bacterial vaginosis has not changed. The new recommended regimen for trichomoniasis is 500 mg oral metronidazole for 7 days, with the alternative being a single 2-g dose of tinidazole. Male partners should receive 2 g oral metronidazole. The CDC also notes that patients taking metronidazole no longer need to abstain from alcohol during treatment.

”Another area where the guidelines changed is in their description of expedited partner therapy, which means that, when we find an index case who has gonorrhea or chlamydia, we always have a discussion with her about getting her partners treated,” Dr. Policar said. “The CDC was quite clear that the responsibility for discussing partner treatment rests with us as the diagnosing provider” since city and county health departments don’t have the time or resources for contact tracing these STIs.

The two main ways to treat partners are to have the patient bring their partner(s) to the appointment with them or to do patient-delivered partner therapy. Ideally, clinicians who dispense their own medications can give the patient enough drugs to give her partner(s) a complete dose as well. Otherwise, providers can prescribe extra doses in the index patients’ name or write prescriptions in the partner’s name.

“In every state of the union now, it is legal for you to to prescribe antibiotics for partners sight unseen, Dr. Policar said.

Margaret Sullivan, MD, an ob.gyn. from rural western North Carolina, noted during the Q&A that an obstacle to partner therapy at her practice has been cost, particularly since many of the men don’t have insurance.

“I have not heard before of prescribing the extra doses for partners under the patient’s name,” Dr. Sullivan said. “I’ve thought about doing it, but [was worried about] it potentially being fraudulent if that patient has Medicaid and we’re prescribing extra doses under her name, so how do you work around that?”

Dr. Policar acknowledged that barrier and recommended that patients use the website/app Goodrx.com to find discounts for out-of-pocket generic medications. He also noted the occasional obstacle of pharmacists balking at filling a double or triple dose.

“What we’ve been suggesting in that circumstance is to literally copy that part of the CDC guidelines, which explains expedited partner therapy or patient-delivered partner therapy and send that off to the pharmacist so they can see that it’s a national recommendation of the CDC,” Dr. Policar said.

Claudia Rodriguez, MD, an ob.gyn. who works at Sherman Hospital in Elgin, Ill., asked about the CDC recommendations for HPV vaccination in older women. Although the CDC permits women over age 26 to receive the HPV vaccine, the agency does not “make a solid recommendation to have this done, which oftentimes makes a big difference in whether or not health insurance will actually pay for vaccination in that circumstance,” Dr. Policar said.

Patients are welcome to request the vaccine after shared decision-making, but “we should never present this as something which is routine,” he said. For women in their 50s, for example, “there’s virtually no data about any additional degree of protection that you would get” from HPV vaccination, Dr. Policar said in response to a similar question from Tara Allmen, MD, an ob.gyn. in New York City. “If you ask me for my personal clinical opinion about it, I would say it’s not going to be worth it,” he said.

Dr Policar had no disclosures. Disclosures were unavailable for attendees who spoke.

Sexually transmitted infection rates have not increased as dramatically in older women as they have in women in their teens and 20s, but rates of chlamydia and gonorrhea in women over age 35 have seen a steady incline over the past decade, and syphilis rates have climbed steeply, according to data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

That makes the STI treatment guidelines released by the CDC in July even timelier for practitioners of menopause medicine, according to Michael S. Policar, MD, MPH, a professor emeritus of ob.gyn. and reproductive sciences at the University of California, San Francisco.

Dr. Policar discussed what clinicians need to know about STIs in midlife women at the hybrid annual meeting of the North American Menopause Society. Even the nomenclature change in the guidelines from “sexually transmitted diseases” to “sexually transmitted infections” is important “because they want to acknowledge the fact that a lot of the sexually transmitted infections that we’re treating are asymptomatic, are colonizations, and are not yet diseases,” Dr. Policar said. “We’re trying to be much more expansive in thinking about finding these infections before they actually start causing morbidity in the form of a disease.”
 

Sexual history

The primary guidelines update for taking sexual history is the recommendation to ask patients about their intentions regarding pregnancy. The “5 Ps” of sexual history are now Partners, Practices, Protection from STIs, Past history of STIs, and Pregnancy intention.

“There should be a sixth P that has to do with pleasure questions,” Policar added. “We ask all the time for patients that we see in the context of perimenopausal and menopausal services, ‘Are you satisfied with your sexual relationship with your partner?’ Hopefully that will make it into the CDC guidelines as the sixth P at some point, but for now, that’s aspirational.”

In asking about partners, instead of asking patients whether they have sex with men, women, or both, clinicians should ask first if the patient is having sex of any kind – oral, vaginal, or anal – with anyone. From there, providers should ask how many sex partners the patient has had, the gender(s) of the partners, and whether they or their partners have other sex partners, using more gender-inclusive language.

When asking about practices, in addition to asking about the type of sexual contact patients have had, additional questions include whether the patient met their partners online or through apps, whether they or any of their partners use drugs, and whether the patient has exchanged sex for any needs, such as money, housing, or drugs. The additional questions can identify those at higher risk for STIs.

After reviewing the CDC’s list of risk factors for gonorrhea and chlamydia screening, Dr. Policar shared the screening list from the California Department of Public Health, which he finds more helpful:

• History of gonorrhea, chlamydia, or pelvic inflammatory disease (PID) in the past 2 years.
• More than 1 sexual partner in the past year.
• New sexual partner within 90 days.
• Reason to believe that a sex partner has had other partners in the past year.
• Exchanging sex for drugs or money within the past year.
• Other factors identified locally, including prevalence of infection in the community.

STI screening guidelines

For those with a positive gonorrhea/chlamydia (GC/CT) screen, a nucleic acid amplification test (NAAT) vaginal swab is the preferred specimen source, and self-collection is fine for women of any age, Dr. Policar said. In addition, cis-women who received anal intercourse in the preceding year should consider undergoing a rectal GC/CT NAAT, and those who performed oral sex should consider a pharyngeal GC/CT NAAT, based on shared clinical decision-making. A rectal swab requires an insertion of 3-4 cm and a 360-degree twirl of the wrist, not the swab, to ensure you get a sample from the entire circumference. Pharyngeal samples require swabbing both tonsillar pillars while taking care for those who may gag.

For contact testing – asymptomatic people who have had a high-risk sexual exposure – providers should test for gonorrhea, chlamydia, HIV, and syphilis but not for herpes, high-risk HPV, hepatitis B, hepatitis C, or bacterial vaginosis. “Maybe we’ll do a screen for trichomoniasis, and maybe we’ll offer herpes type 2 serology or antibody screening,” Dr. Policar said. Providers should also ask patients requesting contact testing if they have been vaccinated for hepatitis B. If not, “the conversation should be how can we get you vaccinated for hepatitis B,” Dr. Policar said.

HIV screening only needs to occur once between the ages of 15 and 65 for low-risk people and then once annually (or more often if necessary) for those who have a sex partner with HIV, use injectable drugs, engage in commercial sex work, have a new sex partner with unknown HIV status, received care at an STD or TB clinic, or were in a correctional facility or homeless shelter.

Those at increased risk for syphilis include men who have sex with men, men under age 29, and anyone living with HIV or who has a history of incarceration or a history of commercial sex work. In addition, African Americans have the greatest risk for syphilis of racial/ethnic groups, followed by Hispanics. Most adults only require hepatitis C screening with anti-hep C antibody testing once in their lifetime. Periodic hepatitis C screening should occur for people who inject drugs. If the screening is positive, providers should conduct an RNA polymerase chain reaction (PCR) test to determine whether a chronic infection is present.

Trichomoniasis screening should occur annually in women living with HIV or in correctional facilities. Others to consider screening include people with new or multiple sex partners, a history of STIs, inconsistent condom use, a history of sex work, and intravenous drug use. Dr. Policar also noted that several new assays, including NAAT, PCR, and a rapid test, are available for trichomoniasis.
 

STI treatment guidelines

For women with mucoprurulent cervicitis, the cause could be chlamydia, gonorrhea, herpes, trichomonas, mycoplasma, or even progesterone from pregnancy or contraception, Dr. Policar said. The new preferred treatment is 100 mg of doxycycline. The alternative, albeit less preferred, treatment is 1 g azithromycin.

The preferred treatment for chlamydia is now 100 mg oral doxycycline twice daily, or doxycycline 200 mg delayed-release once daily, for 7 days. Alternative regimens include 1 g oral azithromycin in a single dose or 500 mg oral levofloxacin once daily for 7 days. The switch to recommending doxycycline over azithromycin is based on recent evidence showing that doxycycline has a slightly higher efficacy for urogenital chlamydia and a substantially higher efficacy for rectal chlamydia. In addition, an increasing proportion of gonorrheal infections have shown resistance to azithromycin, particularly beginning in 2014.

Preferred treatment of new, uncomplicated gonorrhea infections of the cervix, urethra, rectum, and pharynx is one 500-mg dose of ceftriaxone for those weighing under 150 kg and 1 g for those weighing 150 kg or more. If ceftriaxone is unavailable, the new alternative recommended treatment for gonorrhea is 800 mg cefixime. For pharyngeal gonorrhea only, the CDC recommends a test-of-cure 7-14 days after treatment.

For gonorrheal infections, the CDC also recommends treatment with doxycycline if chlamydia has not been excluded, but the agency no longer recommends dual therapy with azithromycin unless it’s used in place of doxycycline for those who are pregnant, have an allergy, or may not be compliant with a 7-day doxycycline regimen.

The preferred treatment for bacterial vaginosis has not changed. The new recommended regimen for trichomoniasis is 500 mg oral metronidazole for 7 days, with the alternative being a single 2-g dose of tinidazole. Male partners should receive 2 g oral metronidazole. The CDC also notes that patients taking metronidazole no longer need to abstain from alcohol during treatment.

”Another area where the guidelines changed is in their description of expedited partner therapy, which means that, when we find an index case who has gonorrhea or chlamydia, we always have a discussion with her about getting her partners treated,” Dr. Policar said. “The CDC was quite clear that the responsibility for discussing partner treatment rests with us as the diagnosing provider” since city and county health departments don’t have the time or resources for contact tracing these STIs.

The two main ways to treat partners are to have the patient bring their partner(s) to the appointment with them or to do patient-delivered partner therapy. Ideally, clinicians who dispense their own medications can give the patient enough drugs to give her partner(s) a complete dose as well. Otherwise, providers can prescribe extra doses in the index patients’ name or write prescriptions in the partner’s name.

“In every state of the union now, it is legal for you to to prescribe antibiotics for partners sight unseen, Dr. Policar said.

Margaret Sullivan, MD, an ob.gyn. from rural western North Carolina, noted during the Q&A that an obstacle to partner therapy at her practice has been cost, particularly since many of the men don’t have insurance.

“I have not heard before of prescribing the extra doses for partners under the patient’s name,” Dr. Sullivan said. “I’ve thought about doing it, but [was worried about] it potentially being fraudulent if that patient has Medicaid and we’re prescribing extra doses under her name, so how do you work around that?”

Dr. Policar acknowledged that barrier and recommended that patients use the website/app Goodrx.com to find discounts for out-of-pocket generic medications. He also noted the occasional obstacle of pharmacists balking at filling a double or triple dose.

“What we’ve been suggesting in that circumstance is to literally copy that part of the CDC guidelines, which explains expedited partner therapy or patient-delivered partner therapy and send that off to the pharmacist so they can see that it’s a national recommendation of the CDC,” Dr. Policar said.

Claudia Rodriguez, MD, an ob.gyn. who works at Sherman Hospital in Elgin, Ill., asked about the CDC recommendations for HPV vaccination in older women. Although the CDC permits women over age 26 to receive the HPV vaccine, the agency does not “make a solid recommendation to have this done, which oftentimes makes a big difference in whether or not health insurance will actually pay for vaccination in that circumstance,” Dr. Policar said.

Patients are welcome to request the vaccine after shared decision-making, but “we should never present this as something which is routine,” he said. For women in their 50s, for example, “there’s virtually no data about any additional degree of protection that you would get” from HPV vaccination, Dr. Policar said in response to a similar question from Tara Allmen, MD, an ob.gyn. in New York City. “If you ask me for my personal clinical opinion about it, I would say it’s not going to be worth it,” he said.

Dr Policar had no disclosures. Disclosures were unavailable for attendees who spoke.

Whereas previous scientific statements from the American Heart Association have addressed how diet, physical activity, and weight control can help prevent and manage hypertension, a new AHA statement focuses on obesity-related hypertension. 

verbaska_studio/thinkstockphotos

The document, which was published online Sept. 20, 2021, in Hypertension, also identifies knowledge gaps and suggests future research directions.

“Given [that] obesity is a major risk factor for hypertension, and hypertension is one of the greatest (if not the greatest) attributable risk factors for most cardiovascular diseases, we thought it was important to focus on weight loss strategies and update what we know about the treatment options that are available to treat obesity hypertension,” writing group chair Michael E. Hall, MD, told this news organization. 

“Medical and surgical strategies may help with long-term weight and blood pressure improvement, in addition to a heart-healthy diet and physical activity,” he noted in a press release from the AHA. “We often don’t consider medications or metabolic surgery until after there has been target organ damage, such as heart injury or having a stroke.”

However, by acting earlier, “we may be able to prevent these complications,” added Dr. Hall, associate division director for cardiovascular diseases at the University of Mississippi Medical Center in Jackson.

“This is not a call for greater use of one specific therapy,” he clarified. “However, we do know that more aggressive treatments including antiobesity medications or metabolic surgery are underutilized.”

According to Dr. Hall, “we treat the secondary problem [i.e., the hypertension or diabetes], but we are not treating the root cause [obesity] as aggressively.”

“Hopefully this statement will increase awareness that there are several [treatment] options [and] bring attention to this major health issue,” he said.

He added that the most important question, in his mind, is how best to tackle obesity among children and adolescents to lower their risk of hypertension and other associated complications.

The statement is aimed at both primary care providers and specialists.
 

Diet, physical activity help, but weight regain common

Losing 5%-10% of body weight can lead to a more than 5–mm Hg reduction in systolic blood pressure and a 4–mm Hg reduction in diastolic blood pressure, the statement notes. Losing 10 kg may lower systolic blood pressure by 5-20 mm Hg.

To manage weight, control hypertension, and reduce the risk of cardiovascular disease, guidelines recommend the Mediterranean diet or the Dietary Approaches to Stop Hypertension (DASH) diet, which both emphasize fruits, vegetables, legumes, nuts, and seeds, with moderate intake of fish, seafood, poultry, and dairy, and low intake of red and processed meats and sweets. The Mediterranean diet also includes olive oil and moderate consumption of (mainly red) wine.  

The effect of intermittent fasting on blood pressure control is not clear, the statement noted.

It added that typically 150-225 minutes and 225-420 minutes of physical activity per week can produce weight loss of 2-3 kg or 5-7.5 kg respectively, and 200-300 minutes of physical activity per week is needed to maintain this weight loss.

“Successful weight-loss maintenance over years therefore typically requires high levels of [physical activity] and limited sedentary time, frequent weight monitoring, and high levels of dietary restraint,” and weight regain is common, the authors summarize.
 

Other options to address obesity, hypertension

Weight-loss pharmacotherapies and metabolic surgery are other options to treat obesity and lower hypertension.

The statement reports that four drugs are approved by the Food and Drug Administration for long-term weight loss: Orlistat (Xenical, Alli), phentermine/topiramate extended release (Qsymia), naltrexone/bupropion (Contrave), and liraglutide 3.0 mg (Saxenda). On June 4, the FDA approved a fifth drug, semaglutide (Wegovy).

The long-term effects of antiobesity medications on blood pressure are mixed.

However, “prescription rates for these drugs remain low, likely because of limited insurance coverage and low levels of clinical proficiency with treating obesity,” Dr. Hall and colleagues write.

Metabolic surgery could be a weight loss option for certain patients, and it is associated with blood pressure lowering.

In the 100-patient Gastric Bypass to Treat Obese Patients With Steady Hypertension (GATEWAY) trial, published in Circulation in 2018, more patients in the Roux-en-Y gastric-bypass group than the control group (84% vs. 13%) met the primary outcome of a 30% or greater reduction in the number of blood pressure-lowering medications at 12 months while maintaining an office blood pressure less than 140/90 mm Hg.

Unanswered questions, future research directions

In 2015-2016, an estimated 18.5% of U.S. children and adolescents aged 2-19 years had obesity, the statement notes. Children with obesity have a twofold increased risk of incident hypertension, and those with severe obesity have an over fourfold increased risk of this outcome, compared with children who have a healthy weight.

Dr. Hall and colleagues emphasized that, “as the prevalence of obesity continues to increase, hypertension and associated cardiorenal diseases will also increase unless more effective strategies to prevent and treat obesity are developed.”

They identified 17 unanswered questions (knowledge gaps) that can guide the direction of future research. These include:

• What new strategies and science-based guidelines are needed to curb the growing evidence of childhood obesity?
• Does intentional weight loss with pharmacotherapy or metabolic surgery in childhood and early adulthood prevent hypertension and subsequent target organ damage in later life?
• What is the optimal amount of time that clinicians should allow before recommending more aggressive weight management strategies (that is, antiobesity medications or metabolic surgery) or hypertension strategies beyond lifestyle changes?

“To me,” Dr. Hall said, “addressing childhood obesity hypertension and determining optimal timing of antiobesity therapies are the most important [issues]. Certainly, these therapies (i.e., diets, medications, surgeries) have some risks, but we don’t have a clear understanding if their benefits outweigh these risks in younger obese people or whether initiating these therapies before the onset of target organ damage such as heart failure” outweigh the risks.

Dr. Hall has reported no relevant financial relationships. Disclosures for the other authors are listed with the article.

A version of this article first appeared on Medscape.com.

Whereas previous scientific statements from the American Heart Association have addressed how diet, physical activity, and weight control can help prevent and manage hypertension, a new AHA statement focuses on obesity-related hypertension. 

verbaska_studio/thinkstockphotos

The document, which was published online Sept. 20, 2021, in Hypertension, also identifies knowledge gaps and suggests future research directions.

“Given [that] obesity is a major risk factor for hypertension, and hypertension is one of the greatest (if not the greatest) attributable risk factors for most cardiovascular diseases, we thought it was important to focus on weight loss strategies and update what we know about the treatment options that are available to treat obesity hypertension,” writing group chair Michael E. Hall, MD, told this news organization. 

“Medical and surgical strategies may help with long-term weight and blood pressure improvement, in addition to a heart-healthy diet and physical activity,” he noted in a press release from the AHA. “We often don’t consider medications or metabolic surgery until after there has been target organ damage, such as heart injury or having a stroke.”

However, by acting earlier, “we may be able to prevent these complications,” added Dr. Hall, associate division director for cardiovascular diseases at the University of Mississippi Medical Center in Jackson.

“This is not a call for greater use of one specific therapy,” he clarified. “However, we do know that more aggressive treatments including antiobesity medications or metabolic surgery are underutilized.”

According to Dr. Hall, “we treat the secondary problem [i.e., the hypertension or diabetes], but we are not treating the root cause [obesity] as aggressively.”

“Hopefully this statement will increase awareness that there are several [treatment] options [and] bring attention to this major health issue,” he said.

He added that the most important question, in his mind, is how best to tackle obesity among children and adolescents to lower their risk of hypertension and other associated complications.

The statement is aimed at both primary care providers and specialists.
 

Diet, physical activity help, but weight regain common

Losing 5%-10% of body weight can lead to a more than 5–mm Hg reduction in systolic blood pressure and a 4–mm Hg reduction in diastolic blood pressure, the statement notes. Losing 10 kg may lower systolic blood pressure by 5-20 mm Hg.

To manage weight, control hypertension, and reduce the risk of cardiovascular disease, guidelines recommend the Mediterranean diet or the Dietary Approaches to Stop Hypertension (DASH) diet, which both emphasize fruits, vegetables, legumes, nuts, and seeds, with moderate intake of fish, seafood, poultry, and dairy, and low intake of red and processed meats and sweets. The Mediterranean diet also includes olive oil and moderate consumption of (mainly red) wine.  

The effect of intermittent fasting on blood pressure control is not clear, the statement noted.

It added that typically 150-225 minutes and 225-420 minutes of physical activity per week can produce weight loss of 2-3 kg or 5-7.5 kg respectively, and 200-300 minutes of physical activity per week is needed to maintain this weight loss.

“Successful weight-loss maintenance over years therefore typically requires high levels of [physical activity] and limited sedentary time, frequent weight monitoring, and high levels of dietary restraint,” and weight regain is common, the authors summarize.
 

Other options to address obesity, hypertension

Weight-loss pharmacotherapies and metabolic surgery are other options to treat obesity and lower hypertension.

The statement reports that four drugs are approved by the Food and Drug Administration for long-term weight loss: Orlistat (Xenical, Alli), phentermine/topiramate extended release (Qsymia), naltrexone/bupropion (Contrave), and liraglutide 3.0 mg (Saxenda). On June 4, the FDA approved a fifth drug, semaglutide (Wegovy).

The long-term effects of antiobesity medications on blood pressure are mixed.

However, “prescription rates for these drugs remain low, likely because of limited insurance coverage and low levels of clinical proficiency with treating obesity,” Dr. Hall and colleagues write.

Metabolic surgery could be a weight loss option for certain patients, and it is associated with blood pressure lowering.

In the 100-patient Gastric Bypass to Treat Obese Patients With Steady Hypertension (GATEWAY) trial, published in Circulation in 2018, more patients in the Roux-en-Y gastric-bypass group than the control group (84% vs. 13%) met the primary outcome of a 30% or greater reduction in the number of blood pressure-lowering medications at 12 months while maintaining an office blood pressure less than 140/90 mm Hg.

Unanswered questions, future research directions

In 2015-2016, an estimated 18.5% of U.S. children and adolescents aged 2-19 years had obesity, the statement notes. Children with obesity have a twofold increased risk of incident hypertension, and those with severe obesity have an over fourfold increased risk of this outcome, compared with children who have a healthy weight.

Dr. Hall and colleagues emphasized that, “as the prevalence of obesity continues to increase, hypertension and associated cardiorenal diseases will also increase unless more effective strategies to prevent and treat obesity are developed.”

They identified 17 unanswered questions (knowledge gaps) that can guide the direction of future research. These include:

• What new strategies and science-based guidelines are needed to curb the growing evidence of childhood obesity?
• Does intentional weight loss with pharmacotherapy or metabolic surgery in childhood and early adulthood prevent hypertension and subsequent target organ damage in later life?
• What is the optimal amount of time that clinicians should allow before recommending more aggressive weight management strategies (that is, antiobesity medications or metabolic surgery) or hypertension strategies beyond lifestyle changes?

“To me,” Dr. Hall said, “addressing childhood obesity hypertension and determining optimal timing of antiobesity therapies are the most important [issues]. Certainly, these therapies (i.e., diets, medications, surgeries) have some risks, but we don’t have a clear understanding if their benefits outweigh these risks in younger obese people or whether initiating these therapies before the onset of target organ damage such as heart failure” outweigh the risks.

Dr. Hall has reported no relevant financial relationships. Disclosures for the other authors are listed with the article.

A version of this article first appeared on Medscape.com.

Whereas previous scientific statements from the American Heart Association have addressed how diet, physical activity, and weight control can help prevent and manage hypertension, a new AHA statement focuses on obesity-related hypertension. 

verbaska_studio/thinkstockphotos

The document, which was published online Sept. 20, 2021, in Hypertension, also identifies knowledge gaps and suggests future research directions.

“Given [that] obesity is a major risk factor for hypertension, and hypertension is one of the greatest (if not the greatest) attributable risk factors for most cardiovascular diseases, we thought it was important to focus on weight loss strategies and update what we know about the treatment options that are available to treat obesity hypertension,” writing group chair Michael E. Hall, MD, told this news organization. 

“Medical and surgical strategies may help with long-term weight and blood pressure improvement, in addition to a heart-healthy diet and physical activity,” he noted in a press release from the AHA. “We often don’t consider medications or metabolic surgery until after there has been target organ damage, such as heart injury or having a stroke.”

However, by acting earlier, “we may be able to prevent these complications,” added Dr. Hall, associate division director for cardiovascular diseases at the University of Mississippi Medical Center in Jackson.

“This is not a call for greater use of one specific therapy,” he clarified. “However, we do know that more aggressive treatments including antiobesity medications or metabolic surgery are underutilized.”

According to Dr. Hall, “we treat the secondary problem [i.e., the hypertension or diabetes], but we are not treating the root cause [obesity] as aggressively.”

“Hopefully this statement will increase awareness that there are several [treatment] options [and] bring attention to this major health issue,” he said.

He added that the most important question, in his mind, is how best to tackle obesity among children and adolescents to lower their risk of hypertension and other associated complications.

The statement is aimed at both primary care providers and specialists.
 

Diet, physical activity help, but weight regain common

Losing 5%-10% of body weight can lead to a more than 5–mm Hg reduction in systolic blood pressure and a 4–mm Hg reduction in diastolic blood pressure, the statement notes. Losing 10 kg may lower systolic blood pressure by 5-20 mm Hg.

To manage weight, control hypertension, and reduce the risk of cardiovascular disease, guidelines recommend the Mediterranean diet or the Dietary Approaches to Stop Hypertension (DASH) diet, which both emphasize fruits, vegetables, legumes, nuts, and seeds, with moderate intake of fish, seafood, poultry, and dairy, and low intake of red and processed meats and sweets. The Mediterranean diet also includes olive oil and moderate consumption of (mainly red) wine.  

The effect of intermittent fasting on blood pressure control is not clear, the statement noted.

It added that typically 150-225 minutes and 225-420 minutes of physical activity per week can produce weight loss of 2-3 kg or 5-7.5 kg respectively, and 200-300 minutes of physical activity per week is needed to maintain this weight loss.

“Successful weight-loss maintenance over years therefore typically requires high levels of [physical activity] and limited sedentary time, frequent weight monitoring, and high levels of dietary restraint,” and weight regain is common, the authors summarize.
 

Other options to address obesity, hypertension

Weight-loss pharmacotherapies and metabolic surgery are other options to treat obesity and lower hypertension.

The statement reports that four drugs are approved by the Food and Drug Administration for long-term weight loss: Orlistat (Xenical, Alli), phentermine/topiramate extended release (Qsymia), naltrexone/bupropion (Contrave), and liraglutide 3.0 mg (Saxenda). On June 4, the FDA approved a fifth drug, semaglutide (Wegovy).

The long-term effects of antiobesity medications on blood pressure are mixed.

However, “prescription rates for these drugs remain low, likely because of limited insurance coverage and low levels of clinical proficiency with treating obesity,” Dr. Hall and colleagues write.

Metabolic surgery could be a weight loss option for certain patients, and it is associated with blood pressure lowering.

In the 100-patient Gastric Bypass to Treat Obese Patients With Steady Hypertension (GATEWAY) trial, published in Circulation in 2018, more patients in the Roux-en-Y gastric-bypass group than the control group (84% vs. 13%) met the primary outcome of a 30% or greater reduction in the number of blood pressure-lowering medications at 12 months while maintaining an office blood pressure less than 140/90 mm Hg.

Unanswered questions, future research directions

In 2015-2016, an estimated 18.5% of U.S. children and adolescents aged 2-19 years had obesity, the statement notes. Children with obesity have a twofold increased risk of incident hypertension, and those with severe obesity have an over fourfold increased risk of this outcome, compared with children who have a healthy weight.

Dr. Hall and colleagues emphasized that, “as the prevalence of obesity continues to increase, hypertension and associated cardiorenal diseases will also increase unless more effective strategies to prevent and treat obesity are developed.”

They identified 17 unanswered questions (knowledge gaps) that can guide the direction of future research. These include:

• What new strategies and science-based guidelines are needed to curb the growing evidence of childhood obesity?
• Does intentional weight loss with pharmacotherapy or metabolic surgery in childhood and early adulthood prevent hypertension and subsequent target organ damage in later life?
• What is the optimal amount of time that clinicians should allow before recommending more aggressive weight management strategies (that is, antiobesity medications or metabolic surgery) or hypertension strategies beyond lifestyle changes?

“To me,” Dr. Hall said, “addressing childhood obesity hypertension and determining optimal timing of antiobesity therapies are the most important [issues]. Certainly, these therapies (i.e., diets, medications, surgeries) have some risks, but we don’t have a clear understanding if their benefits outweigh these risks in younger obese people or whether initiating these therapies before the onset of target organ damage such as heart failure” outweigh the risks.

Dr. Hall has reported no relevant financial relationships. Disclosures for the other authors are listed with the article.

A version of this article first appeared on Medscape.com.

“Evidence alone is not sufficient for clinical decision-making, particularly in chronic pain,” said Jason Busse, DC, PhD, director of Michael G. DeGroote Centre for Medicinal Cannabis Research at McMaster University, Hamilton, Ont., and lead author of a newly released rapid guideline on medical cannabis or cannabinoids for chronic pain.

McMaster University

The recommendations, published online Sept. 9, 2021 in the British Medical Journal, suggest that providers offer patients with chronic pain a trial of noninhaled medical cannabis or cannabinoids if standard care or management is ineffective. However, the “weak” rating attached to the recommendation may compel some clinicians to automatically write off the panel’s recommendations.

“Because of the close balance between benefits and harms and wide variability in patient attitudes, the panel came to the conclusion that [some] patients presented with the current best evidence would likely choose to engage in a trial of medicinal cannabis, if their current care was felt to be suboptimal,” Dr. Busse explained in an interview.

But more importantly, “the recommendation allows for shared decision making to occur, and for different patients to make different decisions based on individual preferences and circumstances,” he said.
 

Evidence supports improved pain and sleep quality, physical functioning

Evidence supporting the use of medical cannabis in chronic pain is derived from a rigorous systematic review and meta-analysis of 32 studies enrolling 5,174 patients randomized to oral (capsule, spray, sublingual drops) or topical (transdermal cream) medical cannabis or placebo. Of note, three types of cannabinoids were represented: phytocannabinoids, synthetic, and endocannabinoids.

The studies included both patients with chronic noncancer pain (28 studies, n = 3,812) and chronic cancer pain not receiving palliative care (4 studies, n = 1,362). On average, baseline pain scores were a median 6.28 cm on a 10-cm visual analog scale (VAS), and median participant age was 53 years. 60% of trials reporting sex differences enrolled female participants. Overall, patients were followed for roughly 2 months (median, 50 days).

Findings (27 studies, n = 3,939) showed that, compared with placebo, medical cannabis resulted in a small, albeit important, improvement in the proportion of patients experiencing pain relief at or above the minimally important difference (MID) (moderate-certainty evidence, 10% modeled risk difference [RD; 95% confidence interval, 5%-15%] for achieving at least the MID of 1 cm).

Medical cannabis (15 studies, n = 2,425) also provided a small increase in the proportion of patients experiencing improvements in physical functioning at or above the MID (high certainty evidence, 4% modeled RD [95% CI, 0.1%-8%] for achieving at least a MID of 10 points).

Additionally, participants experienced significant improvements in sleep quality, compared with placebo (16 studies, 3,124 participants, high-quality evidence), demonstrating a weighted mean difference of –0.53 cm on a 10-cm VAS (95% CI, –0.75 to –0.30 cm). A total of nine larger trials (n = 2,652, high-certainty evidence) saw a small increase in the proportion of patients experiencing improved sleep quality at or above the MID: 6% modeled RD (95% CI, 2%-9%).

On the other hand, benefits did not extend to emotional, role, or social functioning (high-certainty evidence).

First do no harm: Start low, go slow

While these findings provide a rationale for medical cannabis in chronic pain, exploring options with patients can be challenging. Studies on medical cannabis consistently note that patients want information, but data also show that many providers express a lack of knowledge to provide adequate counseling.

There are also legal hurdles. Despite the authorization of medicinal cannabis across a majority of states and territories, cannabis is still a schedule I substance under the Federal Controlled Substances Act. In addition, the absence of standards around formulations, potency, and dosing has also been cited as a major barrier to recommending medical cannabis, as have concerns about adverse events (AEs), especially with inhaled and tetrahydrocannabinol (THC)-predominant formulations.

Like most medications, medical cannabis dosing should be individualized depending on product, patient, and ability to titrate the dose, but the guidelines provide a general rule of thumb. Providers considering therapeutic noninhaled medical cannabis trials are encouraged to start with a low-dose cannabidiol (CBD) oral tablet, spray, or sublingual oil drops 5 mg twice daily, increasing it by 10 mg every 2-3 days depending on the clinical response (to a maximum daily dose of 40 mg/day). If patient response is unsatisfactory, they should consider adding 1-2.5 mg THC/daily, titrated every 2-7 days to a maximum of 40 mg/day.

Still, an important caveat is whether or not adjunctive CBD alone is effective for chronic pain.

Dr. Ziva Cooper

“While we know that one out of seven U.S. adults are using cannabidiol, we know very little about its therapeutic effects when given by itself for pain,” Ziva Cooper, PhD, director of the Cannabis Research Initiative at the University of California, Los Angeles, and an associate professor at-large of psychology and behavioral science, said in an interview. (Dr. Cooper was not involved in the guideline development.)

“But patients tend to self-report that CBD is helpful, and at low doses, we know that it is unlikely to have adverse effects of any significant concern,” Dr. Cooper noted.

Depending on its components, medical cannabis is associated with a wide range of AEs. Studies comprising the evidence base for the guideline reported transient cognitive impairment (relative risk, 2.39; 95% CI, 1.06-5.38), vomiting (RR, 1.46; 95% CI, 1.07-1.99), and drowsiness (RR, 2.14; 95% CI, 1.55-2.95), attention impairment (RR, 4.04; 95% CI, 1.67-9.74), and nausea (RR, 1.59; 95% CI, 1.28-1.99). Of note, findings of a subgroup analysis showed that the risk of dizziness increased with treatment duration, starting at 3 months (test of interaction P = .002).

However, Dr. Cooper explained that, because the included studies were inconsistent in terms of cannabis type (e.g., some looked at synthetic THC or THC-like substances where others looked at a THC/CBD combination) and formulation (capsules, oral mucosal sprays), it’s difficult to tease out component-specific AEs.

“These are really important things to note, especially when you think about different populations that might be using these types of medicines moving forward,” she said.

Toward that end, the guideline specifically states that there is “no reason why the expected benefits would be systematically different among adolescents and emerging adults.”

Among children with cancer, prior study findings reinforce the conclusion that benefits are similar to adults, but studies in this area are limited to end-of-life treatment, childhood cancer with primarily palliative intent, or progressive or relapsed cancer. Because THC’s safety profile is less certain in children, it’s also important to consider adverse neurocognitive effects before initiating a medical cannabis trial in this population.
 

Navigating the landscape

Although promising, the medical cannabis landscape is undoubtedly difficult to navigate, with land mines ranging from a limited inability to simply pick up a prescribing pad to quality control.

With the exception of three Food and Drug Administration–approved products – dronabinol, cannabidiol Rx, and nabilone – U.S. providers are only able to ‘certify,’ not prescribe, medical cannabis for chronic pain, and only if it is included within the state cannabis board’s list of eligible conditions. (A state-by-state guide is available.)

Dr. Jenny Wilkerson

Quality control also varies by product but is critical. “You want to look for certificates of quality assurance,” Jenny Wilkerson, PhD, a research assistant professor of pharmacodynamics at the University of Florida, Gainesville, said in an interview. (Dr. Wilkerson was not involved in the guideline development.)

“A good dispensary should have that information or at least be willing to get that information, but generally speaking, that is something that patients need to ask for,” she emphasized, noting that “most available mass readouts are not divided by lots.”

Initial counseling and AE monitoring and regular follow-up is important, especially among patients who’ve never tried medical cannabis (or older patients whose prior experience may be limited to weaker recreational marijuana).

Notably, the reliance on medical dispensaries to deliver the right information at the right time may prove to be faulty. While recent data show that frontline dispensary workers regularly provide information to customers on their medical conditions and available products, they rarely, if ever, base recommendations on provider input, and never or rarely discuss potential AEs and other risks.

Per the new guideline, inexperienced patients should be seen monthly until a stable dose is achieved; longer times between visits can be considered in those who are more experienced. Still, patients should be advised to contact their provider when pain relief or other goals are insufficient, or when response or problematic AEs occur. This facilitates down-titration to a previously tolerated dose, up-titration in CBD and/or THC, or a different route of administration/formulation altogether.

Dr. Wilkerson pointed out that follow-up visits also provide an opportunity to do a blood draw and ask the lab to conduct pharmacokinetic analysis.

If possible, “ask patients to [ensure that they] take a standard dose before the visit so that the lab can assess the blood percentage of primary compounds and metabolites in the product that they are using,” she explained, noting that the information is helping to determine how “the different ratios may be affecting therapeutic response in individual patients.”

Granted, the guideline is only a start. But it is a good one.

“A lot of physicians want to be able to hang their hat on evidence of the safety and efficacy of these products, and the analysis that was leveraged for this guideline was very rigorous,” Dr. Cooper said.

Not only do they reinforce that “oral cannabinoids can produce small improvements in pain and provide a dosing structure that minimizes risk to the patient, [but they] should be able to help educate physicians who [are looking] for a sense of what the literature tells us at this time,” she added.

“With chronic pain, we often find that different treatments will show small potential benefits and they have a certain risk profile,” Dr. Busse said.

“It’s almost impossible to know what patients think about this option unless you present them with the evidence and ask them to make a decision based on their values and preferences,” he said.

The Michael G. DeGroote Centre for Medicinal Cannabis Research funded the MAGIC Evidence Ecosystem Foundation to support the creation of the guideline. The center receives no funding from industry Dr. Busse, Dr. Cooper, and Dr. Wilkerson reported having no relevant financial relationships.

“Evidence alone is not sufficient for clinical decision-making, particularly in chronic pain,” said Jason Busse, DC, PhD, director of Michael G. DeGroote Centre for Medicinal Cannabis Research at McMaster University, Hamilton, Ont., and lead author of a newly released rapid guideline on medical cannabis or cannabinoids for chronic pain.

McMaster University

The recommendations, published online Sept. 9, 2021 in the British Medical Journal, suggest that providers offer patients with chronic pain a trial of noninhaled medical cannabis or cannabinoids if standard care or management is ineffective. However, the “weak” rating attached to the recommendation may compel some clinicians to automatically write off the panel’s recommendations.

“Because of the close balance between benefits and harms and wide variability in patient attitudes, the panel came to the conclusion that [some] patients presented with the current best evidence would likely choose to engage in a trial of medicinal cannabis, if their current care was felt to be suboptimal,” Dr. Busse explained in an interview.

But more importantly, “the recommendation allows for shared decision making to occur, and for different patients to make different decisions based on individual preferences and circumstances,” he said.
 

Evidence supports improved pain and sleep quality, physical functioning

Evidence supporting the use of medical cannabis in chronic pain is derived from a rigorous systematic review and meta-analysis of 32 studies enrolling 5,174 patients randomized to oral (capsule, spray, sublingual drops) or topical (transdermal cream) medical cannabis or placebo. Of note, three types of cannabinoids were represented: phytocannabinoids, synthetic, and endocannabinoids.

The studies included both patients with chronic noncancer pain (28 studies, n = 3,812) and chronic cancer pain not receiving palliative care (4 studies, n = 1,362). On average, baseline pain scores were a median 6.28 cm on a 10-cm visual analog scale (VAS), and median participant age was 53 years. 60% of trials reporting sex differences enrolled female participants. Overall, patients were followed for roughly 2 months (median, 50 days).

Findings (27 studies, n = 3,939) showed that, compared with placebo, medical cannabis resulted in a small, albeit important, improvement in the proportion of patients experiencing pain relief at or above the minimally important difference (MID) (moderate-certainty evidence, 10% modeled risk difference [RD; 95% confidence interval, 5%-15%] for achieving at least the MID of 1 cm).

Medical cannabis (15 studies, n = 2,425) also provided a small increase in the proportion of patients experiencing improvements in physical functioning at or above the MID (high certainty evidence, 4% modeled RD [95% CI, 0.1%-8%] for achieving at least a MID of 10 points).

Additionally, participants experienced significant improvements in sleep quality, compared with placebo (16 studies, 3,124 participants, high-quality evidence), demonstrating a weighted mean difference of –0.53 cm on a 10-cm VAS (95% CI, –0.75 to –0.30 cm). A total of nine larger trials (n = 2,652, high-certainty evidence) saw a small increase in the proportion of patients experiencing improved sleep quality at or above the MID: 6% modeled RD (95% CI, 2%-9%).

On the other hand, benefits did not extend to emotional, role, or social functioning (high-certainty evidence).

First do no harm: Start low, go slow

While these findings provide a rationale for medical cannabis in chronic pain, exploring options with patients can be challenging. Studies on medical cannabis consistently note that patients want information, but data also show that many providers express a lack of knowledge to provide adequate counseling.

There are also legal hurdles. Despite the authorization of medicinal cannabis across a majority of states and territories, cannabis is still a schedule I substance under the Federal Controlled Substances Act. In addition, the absence of standards around formulations, potency, and dosing has also been cited as a major barrier to recommending medical cannabis, as have concerns about adverse events (AEs), especially with inhaled and tetrahydrocannabinol (THC)-predominant formulations.

Like most medications, medical cannabis dosing should be individualized depending on product, patient, and ability to titrate the dose, but the guidelines provide a general rule of thumb. Providers considering therapeutic noninhaled medical cannabis trials are encouraged to start with a low-dose cannabidiol (CBD) oral tablet, spray, or sublingual oil drops 5 mg twice daily, increasing it by 10 mg every 2-3 days depending on the clinical response (to a maximum daily dose of 40 mg/day). If patient response is unsatisfactory, they should consider adding 1-2.5 mg THC/daily, titrated every 2-7 days to a maximum of 40 mg/day.

Still, an important caveat is whether or not adjunctive CBD alone is effective for chronic pain.

Dr. Ziva Cooper

“While we know that one out of seven U.S. adults are using cannabidiol, we know very little about its therapeutic effects when given by itself for pain,” Ziva Cooper, PhD, director of the Cannabis Research Initiative at the University of California, Los Angeles, and an associate professor at-large of psychology and behavioral science, said in an interview. (Dr. Cooper was not involved in the guideline development.)

“But patients tend to self-report that CBD is helpful, and at low doses, we know that it is unlikely to have adverse effects of any significant concern,” Dr. Cooper noted.

Depending on its components, medical cannabis is associated with a wide range of AEs. Studies comprising the evidence base for the guideline reported transient cognitive impairment (relative risk, 2.39; 95% CI, 1.06-5.38), vomiting (RR, 1.46; 95% CI, 1.07-1.99), and drowsiness (RR, 2.14; 95% CI, 1.55-2.95), attention impairment (RR, 4.04; 95% CI, 1.67-9.74), and nausea (RR, 1.59; 95% CI, 1.28-1.99). Of note, findings of a subgroup analysis showed that the risk of dizziness increased with treatment duration, starting at 3 months (test of interaction P = .002).

However, Dr. Cooper explained that, because the included studies were inconsistent in terms of cannabis type (e.g., some looked at synthetic THC or THC-like substances where others looked at a THC/CBD combination) and formulation (capsules, oral mucosal sprays), it’s difficult to tease out component-specific AEs.

“These are really important things to note, especially when you think about different populations that might be using these types of medicines moving forward,” she said.

Toward that end, the guideline specifically states that there is “no reason why the expected benefits would be systematically different among adolescents and emerging adults.”

Among children with cancer, prior study findings reinforce the conclusion that benefits are similar to adults, but studies in this area are limited to end-of-life treatment, childhood cancer with primarily palliative intent, or progressive or relapsed cancer. Because THC’s safety profile is less certain in children, it’s also important to consider adverse neurocognitive effects before initiating a medical cannabis trial in this population.
 

Navigating the landscape

Although promising, the medical cannabis landscape is undoubtedly difficult to navigate, with land mines ranging from a limited inability to simply pick up a prescribing pad to quality control.

With the exception of three Food and Drug Administration–approved products – dronabinol, cannabidiol Rx, and nabilone – U.S. providers are only able to ‘certify,’ not prescribe, medical cannabis for chronic pain, and only if it is included within the state cannabis board’s list of eligible conditions. (A state-by-state guide is available.)

Dr. Jenny Wilkerson

Quality control also varies by product but is critical. “You want to look for certificates of quality assurance,” Jenny Wilkerson, PhD, a research assistant professor of pharmacodynamics at the University of Florida, Gainesville, said in an interview. (Dr. Wilkerson was not involved in the guideline development.)

“A good dispensary should have that information or at least be willing to get that information, but generally speaking, that is something that patients need to ask for,” she emphasized, noting that “most available mass readouts are not divided by lots.”

Initial counseling and AE monitoring and regular follow-up is important, especially among patients who’ve never tried medical cannabis (or older patients whose prior experience may be limited to weaker recreational marijuana).

Notably, the reliance on medical dispensaries to deliver the right information at the right time may prove to be faulty. While recent data show that frontline dispensary workers regularly provide information to customers on their medical conditions and available products, they rarely, if ever, base recommendations on provider input, and never or rarely discuss potential AEs and other risks.

Per the new guideline, inexperienced patients should be seen monthly until a stable dose is achieved; longer times between visits can be considered in those who are more experienced. Still, patients should be advised to contact their provider when pain relief or other goals are insufficient, or when response or problematic AEs occur. This facilitates down-titration to a previously tolerated dose, up-titration in CBD and/or THC, or a different route of administration/formulation altogether.

Dr. Wilkerson pointed out that follow-up visits also provide an opportunity to do a blood draw and ask the lab to conduct pharmacokinetic analysis.

If possible, “ask patients to [ensure that they] take a standard dose before the visit so that the lab can assess the blood percentage of primary compounds and metabolites in the product that they are using,” she explained, noting that the information is helping to determine how “the different ratios may be affecting therapeutic response in individual patients.”

Granted, the guideline is only a start. But it is a good one.

“A lot of physicians want to be able to hang their hat on evidence of the safety and efficacy of these products, and the analysis that was leveraged for this guideline was very rigorous,” Dr. Cooper said.

Not only do they reinforce that “oral cannabinoids can produce small improvements in pain and provide a dosing structure that minimizes risk to the patient, [but they] should be able to help educate physicians who [are looking] for a sense of what the literature tells us at this time,” she added.

“With chronic pain, we often find that different treatments will show small potential benefits and they have a certain risk profile,” Dr. Busse said.

“It’s almost impossible to know what patients think about this option unless you present them with the evidence and ask them to make a decision based on their values and preferences,” he said.

The Michael G. DeGroote Centre for Medicinal Cannabis Research funded the MAGIC Evidence Ecosystem Foundation to support the creation of the guideline. The center receives no funding from industry Dr. Busse, Dr. Cooper, and Dr. Wilkerson reported having no relevant financial relationships.

“Evidence alone is not sufficient for clinical decision-making, particularly in chronic pain,” said Jason Busse, DC, PhD, director of Michael G. DeGroote Centre for Medicinal Cannabis Research at McMaster University, Hamilton, Ont., and lead author of a newly released rapid guideline on medical cannabis or cannabinoids for chronic pain.

McMaster University

The recommendations, published online Sept. 9, 2021 in the British Medical Journal, suggest that providers offer patients with chronic pain a trial of noninhaled medical cannabis or cannabinoids if standard care or management is ineffective. However, the “weak” rating attached to the recommendation may compel some clinicians to automatically write off the panel’s recommendations.

“Because of the close balance between benefits and harms and wide variability in patient attitudes, the panel came to the conclusion that [some] patients presented with the current best evidence would likely choose to engage in a trial of medicinal cannabis, if their current care was felt to be suboptimal,” Dr. Busse explained in an interview.

But more importantly, “the recommendation allows for shared decision making to occur, and for different patients to make different decisions based on individual preferences and circumstances,” he said.
 

Evidence supports improved pain and sleep quality, physical functioning

Evidence supporting the use of medical cannabis in chronic pain is derived from a rigorous systematic review and meta-analysis of 32 studies enrolling 5,174 patients randomized to oral (capsule, spray, sublingual drops) or topical (transdermal cream) medical cannabis or placebo. Of note, three types of cannabinoids were represented: phytocannabinoids, synthetic, and endocannabinoids.

The studies included both patients with chronic noncancer pain (28 studies, n = 3,812) and chronic cancer pain not receiving palliative care (4 studies, n = 1,362). On average, baseline pain scores were a median 6.28 cm on a 10-cm visual analog scale (VAS), and median participant age was 53 years. 60% of trials reporting sex differences enrolled female participants. Overall, patients were followed for roughly 2 months (median, 50 days).

Findings (27 studies, n = 3,939) showed that, compared with placebo, medical cannabis resulted in a small, albeit important, improvement in the proportion of patients experiencing pain relief at or above the minimally important difference (MID) (moderate-certainty evidence, 10% modeled risk difference [RD; 95% confidence interval, 5%-15%] for achieving at least the MID of 1 cm).

Medical cannabis (15 studies, n = 2,425) also provided a small increase in the proportion of patients experiencing improvements in physical functioning at or above the MID (high certainty evidence, 4% modeled RD [95% CI, 0.1%-8%] for achieving at least a MID of 10 points).

Additionally, participants experienced significant improvements in sleep quality, compared with placebo (16 studies, 3,124 participants, high-quality evidence), demonstrating a weighted mean difference of –0.53 cm on a 10-cm VAS (95% CI, –0.75 to –0.30 cm). A total of nine larger trials (n = 2,652, high-certainty evidence) saw a small increase in the proportion of patients experiencing improved sleep quality at or above the MID: 6% modeled RD (95% CI, 2%-9%).

On the other hand, benefits did not extend to emotional, role, or social functioning (high-certainty evidence).

First do no harm: Start low, go slow

While these findings provide a rationale for medical cannabis in chronic pain, exploring options with patients can be challenging. Studies on medical cannabis consistently note that patients want information, but data also show that many providers express a lack of knowledge to provide adequate counseling.

There are also legal hurdles. Despite the authorization of medicinal cannabis across a majority of states and territories, cannabis is still a schedule I substance under the Federal Controlled Substances Act. In addition, the absence of standards around formulations, potency, and dosing has also been cited as a major barrier to recommending medical cannabis, as have concerns about adverse events (AEs), especially with inhaled and tetrahydrocannabinol (THC)-predominant formulations.

Like most medications, medical cannabis dosing should be individualized depending on product, patient, and ability to titrate the dose, but the guidelines provide a general rule of thumb. Providers considering therapeutic noninhaled medical cannabis trials are encouraged to start with a low-dose cannabidiol (CBD) oral tablet, spray, or sublingual oil drops 5 mg twice daily, increasing it by 10 mg every 2-3 days depending on the clinical response (to a maximum daily dose of 40 mg/day). If patient response is unsatisfactory, they should consider adding 1-2.5 mg THC/daily, titrated every 2-7 days to a maximum of 40 mg/day.

Still, an important caveat is whether or not adjunctive CBD alone is effective for chronic pain.

Dr. Ziva Cooper

“While we know that one out of seven U.S. adults are using cannabidiol, we know very little about its therapeutic effects when given by itself for pain,” Ziva Cooper, PhD, director of the Cannabis Research Initiative at the University of California, Los Angeles, and an associate professor at-large of psychology and behavioral science, said in an interview. (Dr. Cooper was not involved in the guideline development.)

“But patients tend to self-report that CBD is helpful, and at low doses, we know that it is unlikely to have adverse effects of any significant concern,” Dr. Cooper noted.

Depending on its components, medical cannabis is associated with a wide range of AEs. Studies comprising the evidence base for the guideline reported transient cognitive impairment (relative risk, 2.39; 95% CI, 1.06-5.38), vomiting (RR, 1.46; 95% CI, 1.07-1.99), and drowsiness (RR, 2.14; 95% CI, 1.55-2.95), attention impairment (RR, 4.04; 95% CI, 1.67-9.74), and nausea (RR, 1.59; 95% CI, 1.28-1.99). Of note, findings of a subgroup analysis showed that the risk of dizziness increased with treatment duration, starting at 3 months (test of interaction P = .002).

However, Dr. Cooper explained that, because the included studies were inconsistent in terms of cannabis type (e.g., some looked at synthetic THC or THC-like substances where others looked at a THC/CBD combination) and formulation (capsules, oral mucosal sprays), it’s difficult to tease out component-specific AEs.

“These are really important things to note, especially when you think about different populations that might be using these types of medicines moving forward,” she said.

Toward that end, the guideline specifically states that there is “no reason why the expected benefits would be systematically different among adolescents and emerging adults.”

Among children with cancer, prior study findings reinforce the conclusion that benefits are similar to adults, but studies in this area are limited to end-of-life treatment, childhood cancer with primarily palliative intent, or progressive or relapsed cancer. Because THC’s safety profile is less certain in children, it’s also important to consider adverse neurocognitive effects before initiating a medical cannabis trial in this population.
 

Navigating the landscape

Although promising, the medical cannabis landscape is undoubtedly difficult to navigate, with land mines ranging from a limited inability to simply pick up a prescribing pad to quality control.

With the exception of three Food and Drug Administration–approved products – dronabinol, cannabidiol Rx, and nabilone – U.S. providers are only able to ‘certify,’ not prescribe, medical cannabis for chronic pain, and only if it is included within the state cannabis board’s list of eligible conditions. (A state-by-state guide is available.)

Dr. Jenny Wilkerson

Quality control also varies by product but is critical. “You want to look for certificates of quality assurance,” Jenny Wilkerson, PhD, a research assistant professor of pharmacodynamics at the University of Florida, Gainesville, said in an interview. (Dr. Wilkerson was not involved in the guideline development.)

“A good dispensary should have that information or at least be willing to get that information, but generally speaking, that is something that patients need to ask for,” she emphasized, noting that “most available mass readouts are not divided by lots.”

Initial counseling and AE monitoring and regular follow-up is important, especially among patients who’ve never tried medical cannabis (or older patients whose prior experience may be limited to weaker recreational marijuana).

Notably, the reliance on medical dispensaries to deliver the right information at the right time may prove to be faulty. While recent data show that frontline dispensary workers regularly provide information to customers on their medical conditions and available products, they rarely, if ever, base recommendations on provider input, and never or rarely discuss potential AEs and other risks.

Per the new guideline, inexperienced patients should be seen monthly until a stable dose is achieved; longer times between visits can be considered in those who are more experienced. Still, patients should be advised to contact their provider when pain relief or other goals are insufficient, or when response or problematic AEs occur. This facilitates down-titration to a previously tolerated dose, up-titration in CBD and/or THC, or a different route of administration/formulation altogether.

Dr. Wilkerson pointed out that follow-up visits also provide an opportunity to do a blood draw and ask the lab to conduct pharmacokinetic analysis.

If possible, “ask patients to [ensure that they] take a standard dose before the visit so that the lab can assess the blood percentage of primary compounds and metabolites in the product that they are using,” she explained, noting that the information is helping to determine how “the different ratios may be affecting therapeutic response in individual patients.”

Granted, the guideline is only a start. But it is a good one.

“A lot of physicians want to be able to hang their hat on evidence of the safety and efficacy of these products, and the analysis that was leveraged for this guideline was very rigorous,” Dr. Cooper said.

Not only do they reinforce that “oral cannabinoids can produce small improvements in pain and provide a dosing structure that minimizes risk to the patient, [but they] should be able to help educate physicians who [are looking] for a sense of what the literature tells us at this time,” she added.

“With chronic pain, we often find that different treatments will show small potential benefits and they have a certain risk profile,” Dr. Busse said.

“It’s almost impossible to know what patients think about this option unless you present them with the evidence and ask them to make a decision based on their values and preferences,” he said.

The Michael G. DeGroote Centre for Medicinal Cannabis Research funded the MAGIC Evidence Ecosystem Foundation to support the creation of the guideline. The center receives no funding from industry Dr. Busse, Dr. Cooper, and Dr. Wilkerson reported having no relevant financial relationships.

In the first revision to its guidance on the management of osteoporosis in a decade, the North American Menopause Society has issued an updated position statement addressing evolving evidence on osteoporosis issues ranging from screening and risk assessment to appropriate use of preventive therapy in postmenopausal women.

“Since the 2010 statement, there have been important new developments in our field, including better delineation of risk factors for fracture, resulting in better strategies for assessing fracture risk,” Michael R. McClung, MD, who is a NAMS board member and colead of the editorial panel for the 2021 position statement, told this news organization. Dr. McClung is also director emeritus of the Oregon Osteoporosis Center in Portland.

“There is much more information about the long-term safety of therapies,” he added. Dr. McClung also noted “the availability of four new drugs for the prevention and treatment of osteoporosis and clinical experience informing us of the effects of using different treatments in various sequences.”
 

Osteoporosis is substantially underdiagnosed and undertreated

A basis for the update, recently published in Menopause: The Journal of the North American Menopause Society, is the need to tackle the troubling fact that approximately half of postmenopausal women will experience a fracture related to osteoporosis in their lifetime, yet the condition is “substantially underdiagnosed and undertreated,” NAMS underscores.

With that in mind, osteoporosis should be considered by practitioners treating menopausal and postmenopausal women at all levels of care.

“All physicians and advanced care providers caring for postmenopausal women should be comfortable assessing and managing their patients with, or at risk for, fractures,” Dr. McClung added.
 

Osteoporosis prevention in young menopausal women

The NAMS statement covers a broad range of issues, and while most recommendations generally follow those of other societies’ guidelines, a unique aspect is the emphasis on preventing osteoporosis in young menopausal women with estrogen or other drugs.

While underscoring that all menopausal women should be encouraged to adopt healthy lifestyles, with good diets and physical activity to reduce the risk of bone loss and fractures, pharmacologic interventions also have a role, NAMS says.

Though long an issue of debate, NAMS voices support for estrogen therapy as having an important role in osteoporosis prevention, as estrogen deficiency is the principal cause of bone loss in postmenopausal women.

“Hormone therapy is the most appropriate choice to prevent bone loss at the time of menopause for healthy women, particularly those who have menopause symptoms,” the group states. Drug interventions are specifically supported in women with premature menopause, at least until the average age of natural menopause, in addition to those with low bone mineral density (BMD) (T-score < –1.0) and those experiencing relatively rapid bone loss related to acute estrogen deficiency in the menopause transition or on discontinuing estrogen therapy.

“Although using drugs to prevent osteoporosis is not included in national osteoporosis guidelines, a strong clinical argument can be made for doing so, especially in women who come to menopause with low bone mass,” the report states.

And therapy is also recommended if patients have a low BMD and other risk factors for fracture, such as family history, but do not meet the criteria for osteoporosis treatment.

Ultimately, clinicians should work with patients when deciding the options, Dr. McClung said. 

“After carefully weighing the small risks associated with hormone therapy or other therapies begun at the time of menopause, menopause practitioners and their patients can and should make informed decisions about the use of Food and Drug Administration–approved medications to prevent osteoporosis in women who are at risk for developing that condition,” he noted, adding that his view on the matter is his own and not necessarily that of NAMS.
 

New treatments endorsed for high-risk patients to avoid ‘bone attack’

While most patients are treated for osteoporosis with antiremodeling drugs such as bisphosphonates and denosumab, NAMS endorses “a new paradigm of beginning treatment with a bone-building agent followed by an antiremodeling agent” for women at very high risk of fracture.

“Consider osteoanabolic therapies for patients at very high risk of fracture, including older women with recent fractures, T-scores –3.0 and lower, or multiple other risk factors,” the statement suggests.

Among those at highest risk are women who have sustained a first fracture.

“A recent fracture in a postmenopausal woman is the strongest risk factor for another fracture,” Dr. McClung said.

In fact, “having a fracture should be thought of and assessed as a ‘bone attack,’ ” he asserted.

Therapy is recommended in such cases to rapidly increase bone density and reduce their subsequent fracture risk.

“For these patients, osteoanabolic or bone-building agents are more effective than bisphosphonates and are recommended as initial therapy,” Dr. McClung noted.

Treatment discontinuation?

On the issue of drug holidays and when or whether to stop therapy, as no therapies cure osteoporosis, medications should not be permanently stopped, even if bone density increases, NAMS recommends.

“By analogy, we do not stop diabetes therapy when A1c levels become normal,” Dr. McClung noted.

“Because the benefits of therapy on bone density and fracture protection wane, quickly for nonbisphosphonates and more slowly with bisphosphonates, short-term therapy, for instance 5 years, is not optimal treatment,” he said.

While the short-term interruption of bisphosphonate therapy may be considered in some patients, “the concept of ‘drug holidays’ does not pertain to nonbisphosphonate drugs,” Dr. McClung said.

NAMS adds that management of therapeutic choices should instead be ongoing.

“During therapy, reevaluate the treatment goals and the choice of medication on an ongoing basis through periodic medical examination and follow-up BMD testing,” NAMS recommends.

In terms of assessment, the measurement of bone mineral density while on treatment can gauge the current risk of fracture, and NAMS supports the use of the T-score at the hip as an appropriate clinical target in guiding choices of therapy.

Ultimately, “effective tools for diagnosing osteoporosis and assessing fracture risk are available, and well-studied strategies exist for managing bone health in women at both low and high risk of fracture,” NAMS concludes.

“By individualizing treatment approaches and monitoring and adjusting those approaches if the clinical picture changes, the consequences of osteoporosis on a menopausal woman’s activity and well-being can be minimized.”

Dr. McClung has reported receiving consulting fees from Amgen and Myovant, and honorarium for speaking from Amgen and Alexon. He serves on the boards of NAMS and the International Osteoporosis Foundation.

A version of this article first appeared on Medscape.com.

In the first revision to its guidance on the management of osteoporosis in a decade, the North American Menopause Society has issued an updated position statement addressing evolving evidence on osteoporosis issues ranging from screening and risk assessment to appropriate use of preventive therapy in postmenopausal women.

“Since the 2010 statement, there have been important new developments in our field, including better delineation of risk factors for fracture, resulting in better strategies for assessing fracture risk,” Michael R. McClung, MD, who is a NAMS board member and colead of the editorial panel for the 2021 position statement, told this news organization. Dr. McClung is also director emeritus of the Oregon Osteoporosis Center in Portland.

“There is much more information about the long-term safety of therapies,” he added. Dr. McClung also noted “the availability of four new drugs for the prevention and treatment of osteoporosis and clinical experience informing us of the effects of using different treatments in various sequences.”
 

Osteoporosis is substantially underdiagnosed and undertreated

A basis for the update, recently published in Menopause: The Journal of the North American Menopause Society, is the need to tackle the troubling fact that approximately half of postmenopausal women will experience a fracture related to osteoporosis in their lifetime, yet the condition is “substantially underdiagnosed and undertreated,” NAMS underscores.

With that in mind, osteoporosis should be considered by practitioners treating menopausal and postmenopausal women at all levels of care.

“All physicians and advanced care providers caring for postmenopausal women should be comfortable assessing and managing their patients with, or at risk for, fractures,” Dr. McClung added.
 

Osteoporosis prevention in young menopausal women

The NAMS statement covers a broad range of issues, and while most recommendations generally follow those of other societies’ guidelines, a unique aspect is the emphasis on preventing osteoporosis in young menopausal women with estrogen or other drugs.

While underscoring that all menopausal women should be encouraged to adopt healthy lifestyles, with good diets and physical activity to reduce the risk of bone loss and fractures, pharmacologic interventions also have a role, NAMS says.

Though long an issue of debate, NAMS voices support for estrogen therapy as having an important role in osteoporosis prevention, as estrogen deficiency is the principal cause of bone loss in postmenopausal women.

“Hormone therapy is the most appropriate choice to prevent bone loss at the time of menopause for healthy women, particularly those who have menopause symptoms,” the group states. Drug interventions are specifically supported in women with premature menopause, at least until the average age of natural menopause, in addition to those with low bone mineral density (BMD) (T-score < –1.0) and those experiencing relatively rapid bone loss related to acute estrogen deficiency in the menopause transition or on discontinuing estrogen therapy.

“Although using drugs to prevent osteoporosis is not included in national osteoporosis guidelines, a strong clinical argument can be made for doing so, especially in women who come to menopause with low bone mass,” the report states.

And therapy is also recommended if patients have a low BMD and other risk factors for fracture, such as family history, but do not meet the criteria for osteoporosis treatment.

Ultimately, clinicians should work with patients when deciding the options, Dr. McClung said. 

“After carefully weighing the small risks associated with hormone therapy or other therapies begun at the time of menopause, menopause practitioners and their patients can and should make informed decisions about the use of Food and Drug Administration–approved medications to prevent osteoporosis in women who are at risk for developing that condition,” he noted, adding that his view on the matter is his own and not necessarily that of NAMS.
 

New treatments endorsed for high-risk patients to avoid ‘bone attack’

While most patients are treated for osteoporosis with antiremodeling drugs such as bisphosphonates and denosumab, NAMS endorses “a new paradigm of beginning treatment with a bone-building agent followed by an antiremodeling agent” for women at very high risk of fracture.

“Consider osteoanabolic therapies for patients at very high risk of fracture, including older women with recent fractures, T-scores –3.0 and lower, or multiple other risk factors,” the statement suggests.

Among those at highest risk are women who have sustained a first fracture.

“A recent fracture in a postmenopausal woman is the strongest risk factor for another fracture,” Dr. McClung said.

In fact, “having a fracture should be thought of and assessed as a ‘bone attack,’ ” he asserted.

Therapy is recommended in such cases to rapidly increase bone density and reduce their subsequent fracture risk.

“For these patients, osteoanabolic or bone-building agents are more effective than bisphosphonates and are recommended as initial therapy,” Dr. McClung noted.

Treatment discontinuation?

On the issue of drug holidays and when or whether to stop therapy, as no therapies cure osteoporosis, medications should not be permanently stopped, even if bone density increases, NAMS recommends.

“By analogy, we do not stop diabetes therapy when A1c levels become normal,” Dr. McClung noted.

“Because the benefits of therapy on bone density and fracture protection wane, quickly for nonbisphosphonates and more slowly with bisphosphonates, short-term therapy, for instance 5 years, is not optimal treatment,” he said.

While the short-term interruption of bisphosphonate therapy may be considered in some patients, “the concept of ‘drug holidays’ does not pertain to nonbisphosphonate drugs,” Dr. McClung said.

NAMS adds that management of therapeutic choices should instead be ongoing.

“During therapy, reevaluate the treatment goals and the choice of medication on an ongoing basis through periodic medical examination and follow-up BMD testing,” NAMS recommends.

In terms of assessment, the measurement of bone mineral density while on treatment can gauge the current risk of fracture, and NAMS supports the use of the T-score at the hip as an appropriate clinical target in guiding choices of therapy.

Ultimately, “effective tools for diagnosing osteoporosis and assessing fracture risk are available, and well-studied strategies exist for managing bone health in women at both low and high risk of fracture,” NAMS concludes.

“By individualizing treatment approaches and monitoring and adjusting those approaches if the clinical picture changes, the consequences of osteoporosis on a menopausal woman’s activity and well-being can be minimized.”

Dr. McClung has reported receiving consulting fees from Amgen and Myovant, and honorarium for speaking from Amgen and Alexon. He serves on the boards of NAMS and the International Osteoporosis Foundation.

A version of this article first appeared on Medscape.com.

In the first revision to its guidance on the management of osteoporosis in a decade, the North American Menopause Society has issued an updated position statement addressing evolving evidence on osteoporosis issues ranging from screening and risk assessment to appropriate use of preventive therapy in postmenopausal women.

“Since the 2010 statement, there have been important new developments in our field, including better delineation of risk factors for fracture, resulting in better strategies for assessing fracture risk,” Michael R. McClung, MD, who is a NAMS board member and colead of the editorial panel for the 2021 position statement, told this news organization. Dr. McClung is also director emeritus of the Oregon Osteoporosis Center in Portland.

“There is much more information about the long-term safety of therapies,” he added. Dr. McClung also noted “the availability of four new drugs for the prevention and treatment of osteoporosis and clinical experience informing us of the effects of using different treatments in various sequences.”
 

Osteoporosis is substantially underdiagnosed and undertreated

A basis for the update, recently published in Menopause: The Journal of the North American Menopause Society, is the need to tackle the troubling fact that approximately half of postmenopausal women will experience a fracture related to osteoporosis in their lifetime, yet the condition is “substantially underdiagnosed and undertreated,” NAMS underscores.

With that in mind, osteoporosis should be considered by practitioners treating menopausal and postmenopausal women at all levels of care.

“All physicians and advanced care providers caring for postmenopausal women should be comfortable assessing and managing their patients with, or at risk for, fractures,” Dr. McClung added.
 

Osteoporosis prevention in young menopausal women

The NAMS statement covers a broad range of issues, and while most recommendations generally follow those of other societies’ guidelines, a unique aspect is the emphasis on preventing osteoporosis in young menopausal women with estrogen or other drugs.

While underscoring that all menopausal women should be encouraged to adopt healthy lifestyles, with good diets and physical activity to reduce the risk of bone loss and fractures, pharmacologic interventions also have a role, NAMS says.

Though long an issue of debate, NAMS voices support for estrogen therapy as having an important role in osteoporosis prevention, as estrogen deficiency is the principal cause of bone loss in postmenopausal women.

“Hormone therapy is the most appropriate choice to prevent bone loss at the time of menopause for healthy women, particularly those who have menopause symptoms,” the group states. Drug interventions are specifically supported in women with premature menopause, at least until the average age of natural menopause, in addition to those with low bone mineral density (BMD) (T-score < –1.0) and those experiencing relatively rapid bone loss related to acute estrogen deficiency in the menopause transition or on discontinuing estrogen therapy.

“Although using drugs to prevent osteoporosis is not included in national osteoporosis guidelines, a strong clinical argument can be made for doing so, especially in women who come to menopause with low bone mass,” the report states.

And therapy is also recommended if patients have a low BMD and other risk factors for fracture, such as family history, but do not meet the criteria for osteoporosis treatment.

Ultimately, clinicians should work with patients when deciding the options, Dr. McClung said. 

“After carefully weighing the small risks associated with hormone therapy or other therapies begun at the time of menopause, menopause practitioners and their patients can and should make informed decisions about the use of Food and Drug Administration–approved medications to prevent osteoporosis in women who are at risk for developing that condition,” he noted, adding that his view on the matter is his own and not necessarily that of NAMS.
 

New treatments endorsed for high-risk patients to avoid ‘bone attack’

While most patients are treated for osteoporosis with antiremodeling drugs such as bisphosphonates and denosumab, NAMS endorses “a new paradigm of beginning treatment with a bone-building agent followed by an antiremodeling agent” for women at very high risk of fracture.

“Consider osteoanabolic therapies for patients at very high risk of fracture, including older women with recent fractures, T-scores –3.0 and lower, or multiple other risk factors,” the statement suggests.

Among those at highest risk are women who have sustained a first fracture.

“A recent fracture in a postmenopausal woman is the strongest risk factor for another fracture,” Dr. McClung said.

In fact, “having a fracture should be thought of and assessed as a ‘bone attack,’ ” he asserted.

Therapy is recommended in such cases to rapidly increase bone density and reduce their subsequent fracture risk.

“For these patients, osteoanabolic or bone-building agents are more effective than bisphosphonates and are recommended as initial therapy,” Dr. McClung noted.

Treatment discontinuation?

On the issue of drug holidays and when or whether to stop therapy, as no therapies cure osteoporosis, medications should not be permanently stopped, even if bone density increases, NAMS recommends.

“By analogy, we do not stop diabetes therapy when A1c levels become normal,” Dr. McClung noted.

“Because the benefits of therapy on bone density and fracture protection wane, quickly for nonbisphosphonates and more slowly with bisphosphonates, short-term therapy, for instance 5 years, is not optimal treatment,” he said.

While the short-term interruption of bisphosphonate therapy may be considered in some patients, “the concept of ‘drug holidays’ does not pertain to nonbisphosphonate drugs,” Dr. McClung said.

NAMS adds that management of therapeutic choices should instead be ongoing.

“During therapy, reevaluate the treatment goals and the choice of medication on an ongoing basis through periodic medical examination and follow-up BMD testing,” NAMS recommends.

In terms of assessment, the measurement of bone mineral density while on treatment can gauge the current risk of fracture, and NAMS supports the use of the T-score at the hip as an appropriate clinical target in guiding choices of therapy.

Ultimately, “effective tools for diagnosing osteoporosis and assessing fracture risk are available, and well-studied strategies exist for managing bone health in women at both low and high risk of fracture,” NAMS concludes.

“By individualizing treatment approaches and monitoring and adjusting those approaches if the clinical picture changes, the consequences of osteoporosis on a menopausal woman’s activity and well-being can be minimized.”

Dr. McClung has reported receiving consulting fees from Amgen and Myovant, and honorarium for speaking from Amgen and Alexon. He serves on the boards of NAMS and the International Osteoporosis Foundation.

A version of this article first appeared on Medscape.com.

The American Gastroenterological Association recently published an expert review and clinical practice update addressing endoscopic surveillance and management of colorectal dysplasia in patients with inflammatory bowel disease (IBD).

Because of practice-altering advances in therapy and surveillance over the past 2 decades, an updated approach is needed, according to authors led by Sanjay K. Murthy, MD, of Ottawa Hospital Research Institute and Fernando Velayos, MD, from Kaiser Permanente San Francisco Medical Center.

“Not long ago, notions of imperceptible CRC [colorectal cancer] development and urgent need for colectomy in the face of dysplasia dominated IBD practice,” the authors wrote in Gastroenterology. “However, improvements in disease management, as well as endoscopic technology and quality, have dramatically changed the way in which we conceptualize and manage IBD-related dysplasia over the past 20 years.”

Most notably, the authors called for a more conservative approach to sample collection and intervention.

“The practices of taking nontargeted biopsies and of referring patients for colectomy in the setting of low-grade or invisible dysplasia are being increasingly challenged in favor of ‘smart’ approaches that emphasize careful inspection and targeted sampling of visible and subtle lesions using newer technologies ... as well as endoscopic management of most lesions that appear endoscopically resectable,” the authors wrote. “Indeed, surgery is being increasingly reserved for lesions harboring strong risk factors for invasive cancer or when endoscopic clearance is not possible.”

The 14 best practice advice statements cover a variety of topics, including appropriate lesion terminology and characterization, endoscopy timing, and indications for biopsies, resection, and colectomy.

“The proposed conceptual model and best practice advice statements in this review are best used in conjunction with evolving literature and existing societal guidelines as part of a shared decision-making process,” the authors noted.
 

Lesion descriptions

First, the authors provided best practice advice for retirement of three older terms: “dysplasia-associated lesion or mass, adenoma-like mass, and flat dysplasia.” Instead, they advised sorting precancerous colorectal lesions into one of three categories: nonpolypoid (less than 2.5 mm tall), polypoid (at least 2.5 mm tall), or invisible (if detected by nontargeted biopsy).

According to the update, lesion descriptions should also include location, morphology, size, presence of ulceration, clarity of borders, presence within an area of past or current colitis, use of special visualization techniques, and perceived completeness of resection.
 

Surveillance timing

All patients with chronic IBD should undergo colonoscopy screening for dysplasia 8-10 years after diagnosis, the authors wrote. Subsequent colonoscopies should be performed every 1-5 years, depending on risk factors, such as family history of colorectal cancer and quality of prior surveillance exams.

Higher-risk patients may require colonoscopies earlier and more frequently, according to the update. Patients diagnosed with primary sclerosing cholangitis, for instance, should undergo immediate colonoscopy, while patients at high risk of dysplasia (such as those with prior CRC) should undergo annual pouch surveillance.
 

General principles and surveillance colonoscopy

“Conditions and practices for dysplasia detection should be optimized,” the authors wrote, “including control of inflammation, use of high-definition endoscopes, bowel preparation, careful washing and inspection of all colorectal mucosa, and targeted sampling of any suspicious mucosal irregularities.”

Endoscopists should consider use of dye spray chromoendoscopy, “particularly if a standard definition endoscope is used or if there is a history of dysplasia,” the authors wrote. Alternatively, virtual chromoendoscopy may be used in conjunction with high-definition endoscopy.
 

Biopsy, resection, and colectomy

According to the update, if chromoendoscopy is used, then biopsies should be targeted “where mucosal findings are suspicious for dysplasia or are inexplicably different from the surrounding mucosa.”

If chromoendoscopy isn’t used, then the authors advised clinicians to also perform nontargeted biopsies, ideally four per 10 cm of colon, in addition to targeted biopsies of suspicious areas.

When lesions are clearly demarcated and lack submucosal fibrosis or stigmata of invasive cancer, then endoscopic resection is preferred over biopsy. Following resection, mucosal biopsies are usually unnecessary, “unless there are concerns about resection completeness.”

“If the resectability of a lesion is in question, referral to a specialized endoscopist or inflammatory bowel disease center is suggested,” wrote the authors.

They noted that, if visible dysplasia is truly unresectable or if invisible multifocal/high-grade dysplasia is encountered, then colectomy should be performed.
 

IBD control

Finally, the authors emphasized the importance of adequately managing IBD activity to reduce dysplasia risk.

“Because CRC risk in IBD is primarily driven by inflammation, and available data do not demonstrate a clear independent chemopreventive effect of available agents, the focus of chemoprevention in IBD should be control of inflammation,” they wrote.

The expert review was commissioned and approved by the AGA Institute Clinical Practice Updates Committee and the AGA Governing Board. The investigators disclosed no conflicts of interest.

The American Gastroenterological Association recently published an expert review and clinical practice update addressing endoscopic surveillance and management of colorectal dysplasia in patients with inflammatory bowel disease (IBD).

Because of practice-altering advances in therapy and surveillance over the past 2 decades, an updated approach is needed, according to authors led by Sanjay K. Murthy, MD, of Ottawa Hospital Research Institute and Fernando Velayos, MD, from Kaiser Permanente San Francisco Medical Center.

“Not long ago, notions of imperceptible CRC [colorectal cancer] development and urgent need for colectomy in the face of dysplasia dominated IBD practice,” the authors wrote in Gastroenterology. “However, improvements in disease management, as well as endoscopic technology and quality, have dramatically changed the way in which we conceptualize and manage IBD-related dysplasia over the past 20 years.”

Most notably, the authors called for a more conservative approach to sample collection and intervention.

“The practices of taking nontargeted biopsies and of referring patients for colectomy in the setting of low-grade or invisible dysplasia are being increasingly challenged in favor of ‘smart’ approaches that emphasize careful inspection and targeted sampling of visible and subtle lesions using newer technologies ... as well as endoscopic management of most lesions that appear endoscopically resectable,” the authors wrote. “Indeed, surgery is being increasingly reserved for lesions harboring strong risk factors for invasive cancer or when endoscopic clearance is not possible.”

The 14 best practice advice statements cover a variety of topics, including appropriate lesion terminology and characterization, endoscopy timing, and indications for biopsies, resection, and colectomy.

“The proposed conceptual model and best practice advice statements in this review are best used in conjunction with evolving literature and existing societal guidelines as part of a shared decision-making process,” the authors noted.
 

Lesion descriptions

First, the authors provided best practice advice for retirement of three older terms: “dysplasia-associated lesion or mass, adenoma-like mass, and flat dysplasia.” Instead, they advised sorting precancerous colorectal lesions into one of three categories: nonpolypoid (less than 2.5 mm tall), polypoid (at least 2.5 mm tall), or invisible (if detected by nontargeted biopsy).

According to the update, lesion descriptions should also include location, morphology, size, presence of ulceration, clarity of borders, presence within an area of past or current colitis, use of special visualization techniques, and perceived completeness of resection.
 

Surveillance timing

All patients with chronic IBD should undergo colonoscopy screening for dysplasia 8-10 years after diagnosis, the authors wrote. Subsequent colonoscopies should be performed every 1-5 years, depending on risk factors, such as family history of colorectal cancer and quality of prior surveillance exams.

Higher-risk patients may require colonoscopies earlier and more frequently, according to the update. Patients diagnosed with primary sclerosing cholangitis, for instance, should undergo immediate colonoscopy, while patients at high risk of dysplasia (such as those with prior CRC) should undergo annual pouch surveillance.
 

General principles and surveillance colonoscopy

“Conditions and practices for dysplasia detection should be optimized,” the authors wrote, “including control of inflammation, use of high-definition endoscopes, bowel preparation, careful washing and inspection of all colorectal mucosa, and targeted sampling of any suspicious mucosal irregularities.”

Endoscopists should consider use of dye spray chromoendoscopy, “particularly if a standard definition endoscope is used or if there is a history of dysplasia,” the authors wrote. Alternatively, virtual chromoendoscopy may be used in conjunction with high-definition endoscopy.
 

Biopsy, resection, and colectomy

According to the update, if chromoendoscopy is used, then biopsies should be targeted “where mucosal findings are suspicious for dysplasia or are inexplicably different from the surrounding mucosa.”

If chromoendoscopy isn’t used, then the authors advised clinicians to also perform nontargeted biopsies, ideally four per 10 cm of colon, in addition to targeted biopsies of suspicious areas.

When lesions are clearly demarcated and lack submucosal fibrosis or stigmata of invasive cancer, then endoscopic resection is preferred over biopsy. Following resection, mucosal biopsies are usually unnecessary, “unless there are concerns about resection completeness.”

“If the resectability of a lesion is in question, referral to a specialized endoscopist or inflammatory bowel disease center is suggested,” wrote the authors.

They noted that, if visible dysplasia is truly unresectable or if invisible multifocal/high-grade dysplasia is encountered, then colectomy should be performed.
 

IBD control

Finally, the authors emphasized the importance of adequately managing IBD activity to reduce dysplasia risk.

“Because CRC risk in IBD is primarily driven by inflammation, and available data do not demonstrate a clear independent chemopreventive effect of available agents, the focus of chemoprevention in IBD should be control of inflammation,” they wrote.

The expert review was commissioned and approved by the AGA Institute Clinical Practice Updates Committee and the AGA Governing Board. The investigators disclosed no conflicts of interest.

The American Gastroenterological Association recently published an expert review and clinical practice update addressing endoscopic surveillance and management of colorectal dysplasia in patients with inflammatory bowel disease (IBD).

Because of practice-altering advances in therapy and surveillance over the past 2 decades, an updated approach is needed, according to authors led by Sanjay K. Murthy, MD, of Ottawa Hospital Research Institute and Fernando Velayos, MD, from Kaiser Permanente San Francisco Medical Center.

“Not long ago, notions of imperceptible CRC [colorectal cancer] development and urgent need for colectomy in the face of dysplasia dominated IBD practice,” the authors wrote in Gastroenterology. “However, improvements in disease management, as well as endoscopic technology and quality, have dramatically changed the way in which we conceptualize and manage IBD-related dysplasia over the past 20 years.”

Most notably, the authors called for a more conservative approach to sample collection and intervention.

“The practices of taking nontargeted biopsies and of referring patients for colectomy in the setting of low-grade or invisible dysplasia are being increasingly challenged in favor of ‘smart’ approaches that emphasize careful inspection and targeted sampling of visible and subtle lesions using newer technologies ... as well as endoscopic management of most lesions that appear endoscopically resectable,” the authors wrote. “Indeed, surgery is being increasingly reserved for lesions harboring strong risk factors for invasive cancer or when endoscopic clearance is not possible.”

The 14 best practice advice statements cover a variety of topics, including appropriate lesion terminology and characterization, endoscopy timing, and indications for biopsies, resection, and colectomy.

“The proposed conceptual model and best practice advice statements in this review are best used in conjunction with evolving literature and existing societal guidelines as part of a shared decision-making process,” the authors noted.
 

Lesion descriptions

First, the authors provided best practice advice for retirement of three older terms: “dysplasia-associated lesion or mass, adenoma-like mass, and flat dysplasia.” Instead, they advised sorting precancerous colorectal lesions into one of three categories: nonpolypoid (less than 2.5 mm tall), polypoid (at least 2.5 mm tall), or invisible (if detected by nontargeted biopsy).

According to the update, lesion descriptions should also include location, morphology, size, presence of ulceration, clarity of borders, presence within an area of past or current colitis, use of special visualization techniques, and perceived completeness of resection.
 

Surveillance timing

All patients with chronic IBD should undergo colonoscopy screening for dysplasia 8-10 years after diagnosis, the authors wrote. Subsequent colonoscopies should be performed every 1-5 years, depending on risk factors, such as family history of colorectal cancer and quality of prior surveillance exams.

Higher-risk patients may require colonoscopies earlier and more frequently, according to the update. Patients diagnosed with primary sclerosing cholangitis, for instance, should undergo immediate colonoscopy, while patients at high risk of dysplasia (such as those with prior CRC) should undergo annual pouch surveillance.
 

General principles and surveillance colonoscopy

“Conditions and practices for dysplasia detection should be optimized,” the authors wrote, “including control of inflammation, use of high-definition endoscopes, bowel preparation, careful washing and inspection of all colorectal mucosa, and targeted sampling of any suspicious mucosal irregularities.”

Endoscopists should consider use of dye spray chromoendoscopy, “particularly if a standard definition endoscope is used or if there is a history of dysplasia,” the authors wrote. Alternatively, virtual chromoendoscopy may be used in conjunction with high-definition endoscopy.
 

Biopsy, resection, and colectomy

According to the update, if chromoendoscopy is used, then biopsies should be targeted “where mucosal findings are suspicious for dysplasia or are inexplicably different from the surrounding mucosa.”

If chromoendoscopy isn’t used, then the authors advised clinicians to also perform nontargeted biopsies, ideally four per 10 cm of colon, in addition to targeted biopsies of suspicious areas.

When lesions are clearly demarcated and lack submucosal fibrosis or stigmata of invasive cancer, then endoscopic resection is preferred over biopsy. Following resection, mucosal biopsies are usually unnecessary, “unless there are concerns about resection completeness.”

“If the resectability of a lesion is in question, referral to a specialized endoscopist or inflammatory bowel disease center is suggested,” wrote the authors.

They noted that, if visible dysplasia is truly unresectable or if invisible multifocal/high-grade dysplasia is encountered, then colectomy should be performed.
 

IBD control

Finally, the authors emphasized the importance of adequately managing IBD activity to reduce dysplasia risk.

“Because CRC risk in IBD is primarily driven by inflammation, and available data do not demonstrate a clear independent chemopreventive effect of available agents, the focus of chemoprevention in IBD should be control of inflammation,” they wrote.

The expert review was commissioned and approved by the AGA Institute Clinical Practice Updates Committee and the AGA Governing Board. The investigators disclosed no conflicts of interest.

The new guideline on management of heart failure (HF) from the European Society of Cardiology seemed to bear an asterisk or footnote even before its full unveiling in the early hours of ESC Congress 2021.

frankpeters/Getty Images

The document would offer little new in the arena of HF with preserved ejection fraction (HFpEF), so understandably the fast-approaching presentation of a major HFpEF trial – arguably the conference’s marquee event – would feel to some like the elephant in the room.

“I’d like to highlight this unfortunate timing of the guideline, because it’s an hour or 2 before we hear the full story from EMPEROR-Preserved, which I’m sure will change the guidelines,” Faiez Zannad, MD, PhD, University of Lorraine, Vandoeuvre-Les-Nancy, France, said wryly.

Anticipation of the trial’s full presentation was intense as the ESC congress got underway, in part because the top-line and incomplete message from EMPEROR-Preserved had already been released: Patients with HFpEF treated with the sodium-glucose cotransporter 2 inhibitor empagliflozin (Jardiance, Boehringer Ingelheim/Eli Lilly) showed a significant benefit for the primary endpoint of cardiovascular (CV) death or HF hospitalization.

Although empagliflozin is the first medication to achieve that status in a major HFpEF trial, conspicuously absent from the early announcement were the magnitude of “benefit” and any data. Still, the tantalizing top-line results mean that technically, at least, “we have a drug which is effective in reduced and preserved ejection fraction,” Dr. Zannad said.

But the new guideline, published online Aug. 27, 2021, in the European Heart Journal and comprehensively described that day at the congress, was never really expected to consider results from EMPEROR-Reduced. “These new indications do need to go through the regulatory authorities,” such as the European Medicines Agency and the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, observed Carlos Aguiar, MD, Hospital Santa Cruz, Carnaxide, Portugal.

“It does take some time for the whole process to be concluded and, finally, as physicians, being able to implement it in clinical practice,” Dr. Aguiar said as moderator of press briefing prior to the ESC congress.

The ESC guideline’s next iteration or update could well include an SGLT2 inhibitor recommendation that applies beyond the ejection fraction limits of HFrEF. Still, the document summarized that day reflects a number of pivotal concepts with profound treatment implications. Among them are the field’s latest paradigm for medical therapy of HFrEF and the increasingly accepted division of traditional HFpEF into two entities: HF with mildly reduced ejection fraction (HFmrEF); and HFpEF, with its left ventricular ejection fraction (LVEF) threshold raised to 50%.

In fact, HFmrEF in the new document is a drug-therapy indication that barely existed a few years ago but grew in prominence after secondary findings from trials like TOPCAT for spironolactone and PARAGON-HF for sacubitril-valsartan (Entresto, Novartis), an angiotensin-receptor/neprilysin inhibitor (ARNI). Still, the HFmrEF recommendations come with different class and level-of-evidence designations.

Those new guideline features and others in the realm of pharmacologic therapy were summarized by the document’s authors at the 2021 Heart Failure Association of the European Society of Cardiology (ESC-HFA) meeting, and covered at the time by this news organization

The ‘fantastic four’

One of the document’s central recommendations specifies which contemporary drug classes should be initiated, and when, in patients with HFrEF. An ACE inhibitor or ARNI, a beta-blocker, a mineralocorticoid receptor antagonist (MRA), and an SGLT2 inhibitor collectively earned a class I recommendation, “given the importance of these key HFrEF therapies, some of which have been shown to improve outcomes within a month of initiation,” observed Roy S. Gardner, MBChB, MD.

An agent from each of the four classes is to be “commenced and up-titrated as quickly and as safely as possible, whilst using the lowest effective dose of loop diuretic to relieve congestion,” said Dr. Gardner, from Golden Jubilee National Hospital, Clydebank, Scotland, when presenting the full HFrEF portion of the guidelines.

The oral soluble guanylate-cyclase receptor stimulator vericiguat (Verquvo, Merck), which recently emerged from the VICTORIA trial as a modest success for patients with HFrEF and a previous HF hospitalization, gained a class IIb recommendation.

The document’s “simplified algorithm” for managing such patients overall and the advent of SGLT2 inhibitors are new twists in ESC guidelines for HF. But the way the four drug classes are started in patients is key and could take some practitioners time to get used to. There is no prespecified order of initiation.

“We’ve left the door open for clinicians to evaluate the evidence to make sure these four drugs are started, and to tailor how to do it according to the patient,” based on clinical considerations such as blood pressure or renal function, said Theresa A. McDonagh, MD, King’s College London, cochair of the guideline task force.

“The SGLT2 inhibitor trials were done on top of therapy with ACE inhibitors or ARNI, beta-blockers, and MRAs, so some people no doubt will choose to follow a sequenced approach,” Dr. McDonagh said. Other practitioners will consider each patient and attempt to get all four started “as quickly and safely as possible based on the phenotype.”

Importantly, clinicians “should not wait for weeks, months, or years until you have the four drugs in the patient, but you should do this within weeks,” cautioned Johann Bauersachs, MD, Hannover (Germany) Medical School, a discussant for the guideline presentation who is listed as a reviewer on the document.

Although angiotensin-receptor blockers (ARBs) and ACE inhibitors are sometimes thought of as interchangeable, the new guideline does not give them the same weight. “The angiotensin-receptor blocker valsartan is a constituent of the ARNI,” Dr. McDonagh noted. “So, the place of ARBs in heart failure has been downgraded in HFrEF. They are really for those who are intolerant of an ACE inhibitor or an ARNI.”

In practice, ARBs are likely to be used as first-line therapy in some circumstances, observed Dr. Bauersachs. They are “the default option in, unfortunately, many low-income countries that may not afford sacubitril-valsartan. And I know that there are many of them.”
 

Tweaks to device recommendations

The new document contains several new wrinkles in the recommendations for HF device therapy, which should usually be considered only if still appropriate after at least 3 months of optimal medical therapy, Dr. Gardner said.

For example, use of an implantable cardioverter-defibrillator (ICD) has been demoted from its previous class I recommendation to class II, level of evidence A, in patients with nonischemic cardiomyopathy “in light of the data from the DANISH study,” Dr. Gardner said.

The 2016 DANISH trial was noteworthy for questioning the survival benefits of ICDs in patients with nonischemic cardiomyopathy, whether or not they were also receiving cardiac resynchronization therapy (CRT).

The new document also puts greater emphasis on a range of specific CRT patient-selection criteria. Beyond the conventional recommended standards of an LVEF of 35% or less, QRS of at least 150 ms, and left-bundle-branch block on optimal meds, consideration can be given to CRT if the QRS is only 130 ms or greater. “And where it’s appropriate to do so, an ICD could be an option,” Dr. Gardner said.

It also recommends CRT as a replacement for right ventricular pacing in patients with high-degree atrioventricular block. “And this, for the first time, includes patients with atrial fibrillation,” he said. “The previous indications for CRT were in individuals in sinus rhythm.”

The new document recommends that HF in any patient be classified as HFrEF, defined by an LVEF of ≤40%; HFmrEF, defined by an LVEF of 41%-49%; or HFpEF, defined by an LVEF of at least 50%. “Importantly, for all forms, the presence of the clinical syndrome of heart failure is a prerequisite,” observed Carolyn S.P. Lam, MBBS, PhD, Duke-NUS Graduate Medical School, Singapore, at the presentation.

In a critical update from previous guidelines, the term HF with “mid-range” ejection fraction was replaced by the term specifying “mildly reduced” ejection fraction, Dr. Lam noted. The shift retains the acronym but now reflects growing appreciation that HFmrEF patients can benefit from treatments also used in HFrEF, including ACE inhibitors, ARBs, beta-blockers, MRAs, and sacubitril-valsartan, she said.

Support for that relationship comes largely from post hoc subgroup analyses of trials that featured some patients with LVEF 40%-49%. That includes most HFpEF trials represented in the guideline document, but also EMPEROR-Preserved, which saw gains for the primary outcome across the entire range of LVEF above 40%.

The LVEF-based definitions are consistent with a recent HF classification proposal endorsed by the ESC and subspecialty societies in Europe, North America, Japan, India, Australia, New Zealand, and China.

The document doesn’t update recommendations for HFpEF, in which “no treatment has been shown to convincingly reduce mortality or morbidity,” Dr. Lam observed. Still, she noted, the guideline task force “acknowledges that treatment options for HFpEF are being revised even as the guidelines have been published.”

That could be a reference to empagliflozin in EMPEROR-Preserved, but it also refers to the strikingly broad wording of an expanded indication for sacubitril-valsartan in the United States – “to reduce the risk of cardiovascular death and hospitalization for heart failure in adult patients with chronic heart failure” – without specific restrictions on the basis of LVEF. The new indication was announced in early 2021, too late to be considered in the new guidelines.
 

Whither LVEF-based definitions?

During discussion after the guideline presentation, Dr. Zannad speculated on the future of HF classifications based on ventricular function, given trial evidence in recent years that some agents – notably spironolactone, sacubitril-valsartan, and now, apparently, empagliflozin – might be effective in HFpEF as well as HFrEF.

Will the field continue with “LVEF-centric” distinctions across the range of HF, or transition to “some definition in which drug therapies can be used independently across the full spectrum of ejection fraction?” Dr. Zannad posed.

“I think we need to wait and see what some of these trials with the SGLT2 inhibitors are going to show in heart failure with preserved ejection fraction,” Dr. McDonagh replied. “And I think that will be a step for the next guideline, completely redefining heart failure.”

A version of this article first appeared on Medscape.com.

The new guideline on management of heart failure (HF) from the European Society of Cardiology seemed to bear an asterisk or footnote even before its full unveiling in the early hours of ESC Congress 2021.

frankpeters/Getty Images

The document would offer little new in the arena of HF with preserved ejection fraction (HFpEF), so understandably the fast-approaching presentation of a major HFpEF trial – arguably the conference’s marquee event – would feel to some like the elephant in the room.

“I’d like to highlight this unfortunate timing of the guideline, because it’s an hour or 2 before we hear the full story from EMPEROR-Preserved, which I’m sure will change the guidelines,” Faiez Zannad, MD, PhD, University of Lorraine, Vandoeuvre-Les-Nancy, France, said wryly.

Anticipation of the trial’s full presentation was intense as the ESC congress got underway, in part because the top-line and incomplete message from EMPEROR-Preserved had already been released: Patients with HFpEF treated with the sodium-glucose cotransporter 2 inhibitor empagliflozin (Jardiance, Boehringer Ingelheim/Eli Lilly) showed a significant benefit for the primary endpoint of cardiovascular (CV) death or HF hospitalization.

Although empagliflozin is the first medication to achieve that status in a major HFpEF trial, conspicuously absent from the early announcement were the magnitude of “benefit” and any data. Still, the tantalizing top-line results mean that technically, at least, “we have a drug which is effective in reduced and preserved ejection fraction,” Dr. Zannad said.

But the new guideline, published online Aug. 27, 2021, in the European Heart Journal and comprehensively described that day at the congress, was never really expected to consider results from EMPEROR-Reduced. “These new indications do need to go through the regulatory authorities,” such as the European Medicines Agency and the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, observed Carlos Aguiar, MD, Hospital Santa Cruz, Carnaxide, Portugal.

“It does take some time for the whole process to be concluded and, finally, as physicians, being able to implement it in clinical practice,” Dr. Aguiar said as moderator of press briefing prior to the ESC congress.

The ESC guideline’s next iteration or update could well include an SGLT2 inhibitor recommendation that applies beyond the ejection fraction limits of HFrEF. Still, the document summarized that day reflects a number of pivotal concepts with profound treatment implications. Among them are the field’s latest paradigm for medical therapy of HFrEF and the increasingly accepted division of traditional HFpEF into two entities: HF with mildly reduced ejection fraction (HFmrEF); and HFpEF, with its left ventricular ejection fraction (LVEF) threshold raised to 50%.

In fact, HFmrEF in the new document is a drug-therapy indication that barely existed a few years ago but grew in prominence after secondary findings from trials like TOPCAT for spironolactone and PARAGON-HF for sacubitril-valsartan (Entresto, Novartis), an angiotensin-receptor/neprilysin inhibitor (ARNI). Still, the HFmrEF recommendations come with different class and level-of-evidence designations.

Those new guideline features and others in the realm of pharmacologic therapy were summarized by the document’s authors at the 2021 Heart Failure Association of the European Society of Cardiology (ESC-HFA) meeting, and covered at the time by this news organization

The ‘fantastic four’

One of the document’s central recommendations specifies which contemporary drug classes should be initiated, and when, in patients with HFrEF. An ACE inhibitor or ARNI, a beta-blocker, a mineralocorticoid receptor antagonist (MRA), and an SGLT2 inhibitor collectively earned a class I recommendation, “given the importance of these key HFrEF therapies, some of which have been shown to improve outcomes within a month of initiation,” observed Roy S. Gardner, MBChB, MD.

An agent from each of the four classes is to be “commenced and up-titrated as quickly and as safely as possible, whilst using the lowest effective dose of loop diuretic to relieve congestion,” said Dr. Gardner, from Golden Jubilee National Hospital, Clydebank, Scotland, when presenting the full HFrEF portion of the guidelines.

The oral soluble guanylate-cyclase receptor stimulator vericiguat (Verquvo, Merck), which recently emerged from the VICTORIA trial as a modest success for patients with HFrEF and a previous HF hospitalization, gained a class IIb recommendation.

The document’s “simplified algorithm” for managing such patients overall and the advent of SGLT2 inhibitors are new twists in ESC guidelines for HF. But the way the four drug classes are started in patients is key and could take some practitioners time to get used to. There is no prespecified order of initiation.

“We’ve left the door open for clinicians to evaluate the evidence to make sure these four drugs are started, and to tailor how to do it according to the patient,” based on clinical considerations such as blood pressure or renal function, said Theresa A. McDonagh, MD, King’s College London, cochair of the guideline task force.

“The SGLT2 inhibitor trials were done on top of therapy with ACE inhibitors or ARNI, beta-blockers, and MRAs, so some people no doubt will choose to follow a sequenced approach,” Dr. McDonagh said. Other practitioners will consider each patient and attempt to get all four started “as quickly and safely as possible based on the phenotype.”

Importantly, clinicians “should not wait for weeks, months, or years until you have the four drugs in the patient, but you should do this within weeks,” cautioned Johann Bauersachs, MD, Hannover (Germany) Medical School, a discussant for the guideline presentation who is listed as a reviewer on the document.

Although angiotensin-receptor blockers (ARBs) and ACE inhibitors are sometimes thought of as interchangeable, the new guideline does not give them the same weight. “The angiotensin-receptor blocker valsartan is a constituent of the ARNI,” Dr. McDonagh noted. “So, the place of ARBs in heart failure has been downgraded in HFrEF. They are really for those who are intolerant of an ACE inhibitor or an ARNI.”

In practice, ARBs are likely to be used as first-line therapy in some circumstances, observed Dr. Bauersachs. They are “the default option in, unfortunately, many low-income countries that may not afford sacubitril-valsartan. And I know that there are many of them.”
 

Tweaks to device recommendations

The new document contains several new wrinkles in the recommendations for HF device therapy, which should usually be considered only if still appropriate after at least 3 months of optimal medical therapy, Dr. Gardner said.

For example, use of an implantable cardioverter-defibrillator (ICD) has been demoted from its previous class I recommendation to class II, level of evidence A, in patients with nonischemic cardiomyopathy “in light of the data from the DANISH study,” Dr. Gardner said.

The 2016 DANISH trial was noteworthy for questioning the survival benefits of ICDs in patients with nonischemic cardiomyopathy, whether or not they were also receiving cardiac resynchronization therapy (CRT).

The new document also puts greater emphasis on a range of specific CRT patient-selection criteria. Beyond the conventional recommended standards of an LVEF of 35% or less, QRS of at least 150 ms, and left-bundle-branch block on optimal meds, consideration can be given to CRT if the QRS is only 130 ms or greater. “And where it’s appropriate to do so, an ICD could be an option,” Dr. Gardner said.

It also recommends CRT as a replacement for right ventricular pacing in patients with high-degree atrioventricular block. “And this, for the first time, includes patients with atrial fibrillation,” he said. “The previous indications for CRT were in individuals in sinus rhythm.”

The new document recommends that HF in any patient be classified as HFrEF, defined by an LVEF of ≤40%; HFmrEF, defined by an LVEF of 41%-49%; or HFpEF, defined by an LVEF of at least 50%. “Importantly, for all forms, the presence of the clinical syndrome of heart failure is a prerequisite,” observed Carolyn S.P. Lam, MBBS, PhD, Duke-NUS Graduate Medical School, Singapore, at the presentation.

In a critical update from previous guidelines, the term HF with “mid-range” ejection fraction was replaced by the term specifying “mildly reduced” ejection fraction, Dr. Lam noted. The shift retains the acronym but now reflects growing appreciation that HFmrEF patients can benefit from treatments also used in HFrEF, including ACE inhibitors, ARBs, beta-blockers, MRAs, and sacubitril-valsartan, she said.

Support for that relationship comes largely from post hoc subgroup analyses of trials that featured some patients with LVEF 40%-49%. That includes most HFpEF trials represented in the guideline document, but also EMPEROR-Preserved, which saw gains for the primary outcome across the entire range of LVEF above 40%.

The LVEF-based definitions are consistent with a recent HF classification proposal endorsed by the ESC and subspecialty societies in Europe, North America, Japan, India, Australia, New Zealand, and China.

The document doesn’t update recommendations for HFpEF, in which “no treatment has been shown to convincingly reduce mortality or morbidity,” Dr. Lam observed. Still, she noted, the guideline task force “acknowledges that treatment options for HFpEF are being revised even as the guidelines have been published.”

That could be a reference to empagliflozin in EMPEROR-Preserved, but it also refers to the strikingly broad wording of an expanded indication for sacubitril-valsartan in the United States – “to reduce the risk of cardiovascular death and hospitalization for heart failure in adult patients with chronic heart failure” – without specific restrictions on the basis of LVEF. The new indication was announced in early 2021, too late to be considered in the new guidelines.
 

Whither LVEF-based definitions?

During discussion after the guideline presentation, Dr. Zannad speculated on the future of HF classifications based on ventricular function, given trial evidence in recent years that some agents – notably spironolactone, sacubitril-valsartan, and now, apparently, empagliflozin – might be effective in HFpEF as well as HFrEF.

Will the field continue with “LVEF-centric” distinctions across the range of HF, or transition to “some definition in which drug therapies can be used independently across the full spectrum of ejection fraction?” Dr. Zannad posed.

“I think we need to wait and see what some of these trials with the SGLT2 inhibitors are going to show in heart failure with preserved ejection fraction,” Dr. McDonagh replied. “And I think that will be a step for the next guideline, completely redefining heart failure.”

A version of this article first appeared on Medscape.com.

The new guideline on management of heart failure (HF) from the European Society of Cardiology seemed to bear an asterisk or footnote even before its full unveiling in the early hours of ESC Congress 2021.

frankpeters/Getty Images

The document would offer little new in the arena of HF with preserved ejection fraction (HFpEF), so understandably the fast-approaching presentation of a major HFpEF trial – arguably the conference’s marquee event – would feel to some like the elephant in the room.

“I’d like to highlight this unfortunate timing of the guideline, because it’s an hour or 2 before we hear the full story from EMPEROR-Preserved, which I’m sure will change the guidelines,” Faiez Zannad, MD, PhD, University of Lorraine, Vandoeuvre-Les-Nancy, France, said wryly.

Anticipation of the trial’s full presentation was intense as the ESC congress got underway, in part because the top-line and incomplete message from EMPEROR-Preserved had already been released: Patients with HFpEF treated with the sodium-glucose cotransporter 2 inhibitor empagliflozin (Jardiance, Boehringer Ingelheim/Eli Lilly) showed a significant benefit for the primary endpoint of cardiovascular (CV) death or HF hospitalization.

Although empagliflozin is the first medication to achieve that status in a major HFpEF trial, conspicuously absent from the early announcement were the magnitude of “benefit” and any data. Still, the tantalizing top-line results mean that technically, at least, “we have a drug which is effective in reduced and preserved ejection fraction,” Dr. Zannad said.

But the new guideline, published online Aug. 27, 2021, in the European Heart Journal and comprehensively described that day at the congress, was never really expected to consider results from EMPEROR-Reduced. “These new indications do need to go through the regulatory authorities,” such as the European Medicines Agency and the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, observed Carlos Aguiar, MD, Hospital Santa Cruz, Carnaxide, Portugal.

“It does take some time for the whole process to be concluded and, finally, as physicians, being able to implement it in clinical practice,” Dr. Aguiar said as moderator of press briefing prior to the ESC congress.

The ESC guideline’s next iteration or update could well include an SGLT2 inhibitor recommendation that applies beyond the ejection fraction limits of HFrEF. Still, the document summarized that day reflects a number of pivotal concepts with profound treatment implications. Among them are the field’s latest paradigm for medical therapy of HFrEF and the increasingly accepted division of traditional HFpEF into two entities: HF with mildly reduced ejection fraction (HFmrEF); and HFpEF, with its left ventricular ejection fraction (LVEF) threshold raised to 50%.

In fact, HFmrEF in the new document is a drug-therapy indication that barely existed a few years ago but grew in prominence after secondary findings from trials like TOPCAT for spironolactone and PARAGON-HF for sacubitril-valsartan (Entresto, Novartis), an angiotensin-receptor/neprilysin inhibitor (ARNI). Still, the HFmrEF recommendations come with different class and level-of-evidence designations.

Those new guideline features and others in the realm of pharmacologic therapy were summarized by the document’s authors at the 2021 Heart Failure Association of the European Society of Cardiology (ESC-HFA) meeting, and covered at the time by this news organization

The ‘fantastic four’

One of the document’s central recommendations specifies which contemporary drug classes should be initiated, and when, in patients with HFrEF. An ACE inhibitor or ARNI, a beta-blocker, a mineralocorticoid receptor antagonist (MRA), and an SGLT2 inhibitor collectively earned a class I recommendation, “given the importance of these key HFrEF therapies, some of which have been shown to improve outcomes within a month of initiation,” observed Roy S. Gardner, MBChB, MD.

An agent from each of the four classes is to be “commenced and up-titrated as quickly and as safely as possible, whilst using the lowest effective dose of loop diuretic to relieve congestion,” said Dr. Gardner, from Golden Jubilee National Hospital, Clydebank, Scotland, when presenting the full HFrEF portion of the guidelines.

The oral soluble guanylate-cyclase receptor stimulator vericiguat (Verquvo, Merck), which recently emerged from the VICTORIA trial as a modest success for patients with HFrEF and a previous HF hospitalization, gained a class IIb recommendation.

The document’s “simplified algorithm” for managing such patients overall and the advent of SGLT2 inhibitors are new twists in ESC guidelines for HF. But the way the four drug classes are started in patients is key and could take some practitioners time to get used to. There is no prespecified order of initiation.

“We’ve left the door open for clinicians to evaluate the evidence to make sure these four drugs are started, and to tailor how to do it according to the patient,” based on clinical considerations such as blood pressure or renal function, said Theresa A. McDonagh, MD, King’s College London, cochair of the guideline task force.

“The SGLT2 inhibitor trials were done on top of therapy with ACE inhibitors or ARNI, beta-blockers, and MRAs, so some people no doubt will choose to follow a sequenced approach,” Dr. McDonagh said. Other practitioners will consider each patient and attempt to get all four started “as quickly and safely as possible based on the phenotype.”

Importantly, clinicians “should not wait for weeks, months, or years until you have the four drugs in the patient, but you should do this within weeks,” cautioned Johann Bauersachs, MD, Hannover (Germany) Medical School, a discussant for the guideline presentation who is listed as a reviewer on the document.

Although angiotensin-receptor blockers (ARBs) and ACE inhibitors are sometimes thought of as interchangeable, the new guideline does not give them the same weight. “The angiotensin-receptor blocker valsartan is a constituent of the ARNI,” Dr. McDonagh noted. “So, the place of ARBs in heart failure has been downgraded in HFrEF. They are really for those who are intolerant of an ACE inhibitor or an ARNI.”

In practice, ARBs are likely to be used as first-line therapy in some circumstances, observed Dr. Bauersachs. They are “the default option in, unfortunately, many low-income countries that may not afford sacubitril-valsartan. And I know that there are many of them.”
 

Tweaks to device recommendations

The new document contains several new wrinkles in the recommendations for HF device therapy, which should usually be considered only if still appropriate after at least 3 months of optimal medical therapy, Dr. Gardner said.

For example, use of an implantable cardioverter-defibrillator (ICD) has been demoted from its previous class I recommendation to class II, level of evidence A, in patients with nonischemic cardiomyopathy “in light of the data from the DANISH study,” Dr. Gardner said.

The 2016 DANISH trial was noteworthy for questioning the survival benefits of ICDs in patients with nonischemic cardiomyopathy, whether or not they were also receiving cardiac resynchronization therapy (CRT).

The new document also puts greater emphasis on a range of specific CRT patient-selection criteria. Beyond the conventional recommended standards of an LVEF of 35% or less, QRS of at least 150 ms, and left-bundle-branch block on optimal meds, consideration can be given to CRT if the QRS is only 130 ms or greater. “And where it’s appropriate to do so, an ICD could be an option,” Dr. Gardner said.

It also recommends CRT as a replacement for right ventricular pacing in patients with high-degree atrioventricular block. “And this, for the first time, includes patients with atrial fibrillation,” he said. “The previous indications for CRT were in individuals in sinus rhythm.”

The new document recommends that HF in any patient be classified as HFrEF, defined by an LVEF of ≤40%; HFmrEF, defined by an LVEF of 41%-49%; or HFpEF, defined by an LVEF of at least 50%. “Importantly, for all forms, the presence of the clinical syndrome of heart failure is a prerequisite,” observed Carolyn S.P. Lam, MBBS, PhD, Duke-NUS Graduate Medical School, Singapore, at the presentation.

In a critical update from previous guidelines, the term HF with “mid-range” ejection fraction was replaced by the term specifying “mildly reduced” ejection fraction, Dr. Lam noted. The shift retains the acronym but now reflects growing appreciation that HFmrEF patients can benefit from treatments also used in HFrEF, including ACE inhibitors, ARBs, beta-blockers, MRAs, and sacubitril-valsartan, she said.

Support for that relationship comes largely from post hoc subgroup analyses of trials that featured some patients with LVEF 40%-49%. That includes most HFpEF trials represented in the guideline document, but also EMPEROR-Preserved, which saw gains for the primary outcome across the entire range of LVEF above 40%.

The LVEF-based definitions are consistent with a recent HF classification proposal endorsed by the ESC and subspecialty societies in Europe, North America, Japan, India, Australia, New Zealand, and China.

The document doesn’t update recommendations for HFpEF, in which “no treatment has been shown to convincingly reduce mortality or morbidity,” Dr. Lam observed. Still, she noted, the guideline task force “acknowledges that treatment options for HFpEF are being revised even as the guidelines have been published.”

That could be a reference to empagliflozin in EMPEROR-Preserved, but it also refers to the strikingly broad wording of an expanded indication for sacubitril-valsartan in the United States – “to reduce the risk of cardiovascular death and hospitalization for heart failure in adult patients with chronic heart failure” – without specific restrictions on the basis of LVEF. The new indication was announced in early 2021, too late to be considered in the new guidelines.
 

Whither LVEF-based definitions?

During discussion after the guideline presentation, Dr. Zannad speculated on the future of HF classifications based on ventricular function, given trial evidence in recent years that some agents – notably spironolactone, sacubitril-valsartan, and now, apparently, empagliflozin – might be effective in HFpEF as well as HFrEF.

Will the field continue with “LVEF-centric” distinctions across the range of HF, or transition to “some definition in which drug therapies can be used independently across the full spectrum of ejection fraction?” Dr. Zannad posed.

“I think we need to wait and see what some of these trials with the SGLT2 inhibitors are going to show in heart failure with preserved ejection fraction,” Dr. McDonagh replied. “And I think that will be a step for the next guideline, completely redefining heart failure.”

A version of this article first appeared on Medscape.com.

Estimating an individual’s risk of cardiovascular disease (CVD) remains the cornerstone of the 2021 European Society of Cardiology guidelines on CVD prevention in clinical practice. The new guidelines were published online Aug. 30 in the European Heart Journal to coincide with presentation at the European Stroke Congress (ESOC) 2021.   

They were developed by an ESOC task force in collaboration with 12 medical societies and with special contribution of the European Association of Preventive Cardiology.

“A chief goal of the task force was to create a single CVD prevention guideline for everyone – for primary care, for hospital care, for guiding clinical practice – so one guideline for all,” said cochair of the guideline committee Frank Visseren, MD, PhD, University Medical Center Utrecht, Netherlands. “We also wanted to make a more personalized CVD prevention guideline, instead of a one-size-fits-all. In clinical practice, people are very, very different, and we really want to have a more individualized prevention guideline,” said Dr. Visseren, as well as provide “more room for shared decision-making.”
 

Prevention at the individual and population levels

The new guidelines also give more attention to CVD prevention in older persons. “Many of our patients are over 70 years old and we really want to have more detail, more guidance on older persons,” said Dr. Visseren.

The guideline is divided into two sections. One section covers CVD prevention at the individual level in apparently healthy people, in patients with established CVD, and in those with diabetes, familial hypercholesterolemia, or chronic kidney disease.

The other section covers CVD prevention at the population level, including public health policy, interventions, and the environment, including putting in place measures to reduce air pollution, use of fossil fuels, and limiting carbon dioxide emissions.

Targets for blood lipids, blood pressure, and glycemic control in diabetes remain in line with recent ESC guidelines on dyslipidemias, hypertension, or diabetes.

However, the guidelines introduce a new stepwise treatment-intensification approach to achieve these targets, with consideration of CVD risk, treatment benefit of risk factors, risk modifiers, comorbidities, and patient preferences.

The 2021 CVD prevention guidelines also embrace the recently published Systemic Coronary Risk Estimation 2 (SCORE2) and Systemic Coronary Risk Estimation 2-Older Persons (SCORE2-OP) algorithms. “The algorithms we are using are a bit old and we want to have more updated risk prediction, because that’s the starting point of CVD prevention,” Dr. Visseren said.

The guidelines also introduce age-specific risk thresholds for risk factor treatments in apparently healthy people and provide estimation of lifetime CVD risk and treatment benefit. This will allow clinicians to have “an informed discussion with patients on lifetime risk and potential treatment benefits,” Dr. Visseren said.

For the first time, the guidelines recommend smoking cessation regardless of whether it leads to weight gain, as weight gain does not lessen the benefits of cessation.

Regarding exercise, adults of all ages should aim for at least 150-300 minutes a week of moderate, or 75-150 minutes a week of vigorous, aerobic physical activity. The guidelines recommend reducing sedentary time and engaging in at least light activity throughout the day.

Regarding nutrition, the guidelines advise adopting a Mediterranean or similar diet; restricting alcohol intake to a maximum of 100 g per week (a standard drink is 8-14 g); eating fish, preferably fatty fish, at least once a week; and restricting consumption of meat, particularly processed meat.

Also for the first time, the guidelines state that bariatric surgery should be considered for obese individuals at elevated risk of CVD when a healthy diet and exercise fail to lead to weight loss that is maintained.

They note that individuals with mental disorders need additional attention and support to improve adherence to lifestyle changes and drug treatment.

They advise consideration of referring patients with heart disease and significant stress and anxiety to psychotherapeutic stress management to reduce stress symptoms and improve CV outcomes.

Potential cost issues that could be considered when implementing the guidelines are also reviewed.

Dr. Visseren acknowledged and thanked the task force members for continuing their work on the guidelines over the 2 “challenging” years.
 

Setting the bar lower?

Discussant for the guideline presentation, Diederick Grobbee, MD, University Medical Center Utrecht, who was not involved in drafting the guidelines, said he does have one conflict of interest, which is a “passion for prevention.” From that perspective, he said the guideline panel “should be applauded; the once-every-5-year issuing of the prevention guidelines is a major event.”

Dr. Grobbee noted that the working group “really tried to follow their ambitions and goals, in a way making the guidelines simpler, or perhaps setting the bar not initially as high as we used to do, which may, in fact, sometimes scare off physicians and patients alike.”

“We’ve had prevention guidelines for quite some time now, yet looking at what is accomplished in practice is sobering,” said Dr. Grobbee. Introducing a stepwise approach is “really appealing,” he added.

A version of this article first appeared on Medscape.com.

Estimating an individual’s risk of cardiovascular disease (CVD) remains the cornerstone of the 2021 European Society of Cardiology guidelines on CVD prevention in clinical practice. The new guidelines were published online Aug. 30 in the European Heart Journal to coincide with presentation at the European Stroke Congress (ESOC) 2021.   

They were developed by an ESOC task force in collaboration with 12 medical societies and with special contribution of the European Association of Preventive Cardiology.

“A chief goal of the task force was to create a single CVD prevention guideline for everyone – for primary care, for hospital care, for guiding clinical practice – so one guideline for all,” said cochair of the guideline committee Frank Visseren, MD, PhD, University Medical Center Utrecht, Netherlands. “We also wanted to make a more personalized CVD prevention guideline, instead of a one-size-fits-all. In clinical practice, people are very, very different, and we really want to have a more individualized prevention guideline,” said Dr. Visseren, as well as provide “more room for shared decision-making.”
 

Prevention at the individual and population levels

The new guidelines also give more attention to CVD prevention in older persons. “Many of our patients are over 70 years old and we really want to have more detail, more guidance on older persons,” said Dr. Visseren.

The guideline is divided into two sections. One section covers CVD prevention at the individual level in apparently healthy people, in patients with established CVD, and in those with diabetes, familial hypercholesterolemia, or chronic kidney disease.

The other section covers CVD prevention at the population level, including public health policy, interventions, and the environment, including putting in place measures to reduce air pollution, use of fossil fuels, and limiting carbon dioxide emissions.

Targets for blood lipids, blood pressure, and glycemic control in diabetes remain in line with recent ESC guidelines on dyslipidemias, hypertension, or diabetes.

However, the guidelines introduce a new stepwise treatment-intensification approach to achieve these targets, with consideration of CVD risk, treatment benefit of risk factors, risk modifiers, comorbidities, and patient preferences.

The 2021 CVD prevention guidelines also embrace the recently published Systemic Coronary Risk Estimation 2 (SCORE2) and Systemic Coronary Risk Estimation 2-Older Persons (SCORE2-OP) algorithms. “The algorithms we are using are a bit old and we want to have more updated risk prediction, because that’s the starting point of CVD prevention,” Dr. Visseren said.

The guidelines also introduce age-specific risk thresholds for risk factor treatments in apparently healthy people and provide estimation of lifetime CVD risk and treatment benefit. This will allow clinicians to have “an informed discussion with patients on lifetime risk and potential treatment benefits,” Dr. Visseren said.

For the first time, the guidelines recommend smoking cessation regardless of whether it leads to weight gain, as weight gain does not lessen the benefits of cessation.

Regarding exercise, adults of all ages should aim for at least 150-300 minutes a week of moderate, or 75-150 minutes a week of vigorous, aerobic physical activity. The guidelines recommend reducing sedentary time and engaging in at least light activity throughout the day.

Regarding nutrition, the guidelines advise adopting a Mediterranean or similar diet; restricting alcohol intake to a maximum of 100 g per week (a standard drink is 8-14 g); eating fish, preferably fatty fish, at least once a week; and restricting consumption of meat, particularly processed meat.

Also for the first time, the guidelines state that bariatric surgery should be considered for obese individuals at elevated risk of CVD when a healthy diet and exercise fail to lead to weight loss that is maintained.

They note that individuals with mental disorders need additional attention and support to improve adherence to lifestyle changes and drug treatment.

They advise consideration of referring patients with heart disease and significant stress and anxiety to psychotherapeutic stress management to reduce stress symptoms and improve CV outcomes.

Potential cost issues that could be considered when implementing the guidelines are also reviewed.

Dr. Visseren acknowledged and thanked the task force members for continuing their work on the guidelines over the 2 “challenging” years.
 

Setting the bar lower?

Discussant for the guideline presentation, Diederick Grobbee, MD, University Medical Center Utrecht, who was not involved in drafting the guidelines, said he does have one conflict of interest, which is a “passion for prevention.” From that perspective, he said the guideline panel “should be applauded; the once-every-5-year issuing of the prevention guidelines is a major event.”

Dr. Grobbee noted that the working group “really tried to follow their ambitions and goals, in a way making the guidelines simpler, or perhaps setting the bar not initially as high as we used to do, which may, in fact, sometimes scare off physicians and patients alike.”

“We’ve had prevention guidelines for quite some time now, yet looking at what is accomplished in practice is sobering,” said Dr. Grobbee. Introducing a stepwise approach is “really appealing,” he added.

A version of this article first appeared on Medscape.com.

Estimating an individual’s risk of cardiovascular disease (CVD) remains the cornerstone of the 2021 European Society of Cardiology guidelines on CVD prevention in clinical practice. The new guidelines were published online Aug. 30 in the European Heart Journal to coincide with presentation at the European Stroke Congress (ESOC) 2021.   

They were developed by an ESOC task force in collaboration with 12 medical societies and with special contribution of the European Association of Preventive Cardiology.

“A chief goal of the task force was to create a single CVD prevention guideline for everyone – for primary care, for hospital care, for guiding clinical practice – so one guideline for all,” said cochair of the guideline committee Frank Visseren, MD, PhD, University Medical Center Utrecht, Netherlands. “We also wanted to make a more personalized CVD prevention guideline, instead of a one-size-fits-all. In clinical practice, people are very, very different, and we really want to have a more individualized prevention guideline,” said Dr. Visseren, as well as provide “more room for shared decision-making.”
 

Prevention at the individual and population levels

The new guidelines also give more attention to CVD prevention in older persons. “Many of our patients are over 70 years old and we really want to have more detail, more guidance on older persons,” said Dr. Visseren.

The guideline is divided into two sections. One section covers CVD prevention at the individual level in apparently healthy people, in patients with established CVD, and in those with diabetes, familial hypercholesterolemia, or chronic kidney disease.

The other section covers CVD prevention at the population level, including public health policy, interventions, and the environment, including putting in place measures to reduce air pollution, use of fossil fuels, and limiting carbon dioxide emissions.

Targets for blood lipids, blood pressure, and glycemic control in diabetes remain in line with recent ESC guidelines on dyslipidemias, hypertension, or diabetes.

However, the guidelines introduce a new stepwise treatment-intensification approach to achieve these targets, with consideration of CVD risk, treatment benefit of risk factors, risk modifiers, comorbidities, and patient preferences.

The 2021 CVD prevention guidelines also embrace the recently published Systemic Coronary Risk Estimation 2 (SCORE2) and Systemic Coronary Risk Estimation 2-Older Persons (SCORE2-OP) algorithms. “The algorithms we are using are a bit old and we want to have more updated risk prediction, because that’s the starting point of CVD prevention,” Dr. Visseren said.

The guidelines also introduce age-specific risk thresholds for risk factor treatments in apparently healthy people and provide estimation of lifetime CVD risk and treatment benefit. This will allow clinicians to have “an informed discussion with patients on lifetime risk and potential treatment benefits,” Dr. Visseren said.

For the first time, the guidelines recommend smoking cessation regardless of whether it leads to weight gain, as weight gain does not lessen the benefits of cessation.

Regarding exercise, adults of all ages should aim for at least 150-300 minutes a week of moderate, or 75-150 minutes a week of vigorous, aerobic physical activity. The guidelines recommend reducing sedentary time and engaging in at least light activity throughout the day.

Regarding nutrition, the guidelines advise adopting a Mediterranean or similar diet; restricting alcohol intake to a maximum of 100 g per week (a standard drink is 8-14 g); eating fish, preferably fatty fish, at least once a week; and restricting consumption of meat, particularly processed meat.

Also for the first time, the guidelines state that bariatric surgery should be considered for obese individuals at elevated risk of CVD when a healthy diet and exercise fail to lead to weight loss that is maintained.

They note that individuals with mental disorders need additional attention and support to improve adherence to lifestyle changes and drug treatment.

They advise consideration of referring patients with heart disease and significant stress and anxiety to psychotherapeutic stress management to reduce stress symptoms and improve CV outcomes.

Potential cost issues that could be considered when implementing the guidelines are also reviewed.

Dr. Visseren acknowledged and thanked the task force members for continuing their work on the guidelines over the 2 “challenging” years.
 

Setting the bar lower?

Discussant for the guideline presentation, Diederick Grobbee, MD, University Medical Center Utrecht, who was not involved in drafting the guidelines, said he does have one conflict of interest, which is a “passion for prevention.” From that perspective, he said the guideline panel “should be applauded; the once-every-5-year issuing of the prevention guidelines is a major event.”

Dr. Grobbee noted that the working group “really tried to follow their ambitions and goals, in a way making the guidelines simpler, or perhaps setting the bar not initially as high as we used to do, which may, in fact, sometimes scare off physicians and patients alike.”

“We’ve had prevention guidelines for quite some time now, yet looking at what is accomplished in practice is sobering,” said Dr. Grobbee. Introducing a stepwise approach is “really appealing,” he added.

A version of this article first appeared on Medscape.com.