FAMCAT

The Familial Hypercholesterolaemia Case Identification Tool (FAMCAT) is a quality improvement tool designed to help practices find patients who may have FH but also may be missing a coded diagnosis. The tool was developed with colleagues in PRISM (Primary Care Stratified Medicines) at the University of Nottingham.

Early identification and effective treatment of FH patients can help to ensure normal life expectancy.

The original PRIMIS FH tool translated the findings of "Improving identification of familial hypercholesterolaemia in primary care: Derivation and validation of the familial hypercholesterolaemia case ascertainment tool (FAMCAT)" into a practice based audit which stratifies patients into “very high risk”, “high risk”, and “population risk” and allows GPs to target their case-finding.

PRIMIS is updating the current tool which will be available early in 2020.  The update will include a refinement to the FAMCAT algorithm that will make the identification of patients with possible FH more specific (link to The Lancet).

PRIMIS is also creating a package of learning which will support the use of the tool and understands how practice systems and pathways can support early identification of patients. If you would like to register interest for the updated tool or the support package, please email PRIMIS:

Email PRIMIS

While this development takes place, the current tool is available on a request-only basis. If you would like to access to this tool, please email using the link above.

This quality improvement tool helps practices by

• generating a list of patients who may have FH but who do not have a coded diagnosis
• We will offer the practices 4 ways to identify these patients:
  • use the revised FAMCAT algorithm, identifying patients who are at increased risk of developing FH and categorising them by level of risk
  • apply the Simon Broome FH diagnostic criteria to identify patients fulfilling probable and definite criteria
  • collate details for the DLCN FH diagnostic criteria to identify patients fulfilling probable, possible and definite criteria
  • aligned with NICE recommendations, identify patients, aged 30+ years, at high risk of FH based on Chol >9 mmol/l
• providing a mail merge function to generate letters to send to  patients at high risk of FH about collecting their family history
• establishing a more accurate prevalence rate for FH within the practice population
• highlighting patients with the disease who are currently untreated
• identifying opportunities to optimise lipid lowering treatment regimes for all patients with the disease
• offering a comparative analysis service via CHART Online, which enables comparison with other practices, locally or nationally
• contributing to the delivery of the NHS Outcomes Framework and the Clinical Commissioning Group Outcomes Indicator Set
• providing data in a format for appraisal and revalidation and providing a method for GPs to reflect on their clinical practice

The FAMCAT tool utilises EMIS Web searches which can be run instantly, negating the need to use MIQUEST, saving time and resources but also giving the practice picture in real time. Practices with other clinical systems can still continue to use the tool using MIQUEST as this doesn’t present the same barrier.    

Obtaining the FAMCAT tool

Please contact PRIMIS if you wish to discuss obtaining this tool.

Email PRIMIS