What is the 2005 Standard of Care for Interpreting ECGs?
The American Heart Association and the American College of Cardiology put forward a joint statement of their standard for 2005. Every ECG interpreted by a Cardiologist or an ECG-tested physician. The only board certificationmeeting this standard is Cardiology. All other physicians must be tested in reading ECGs using arecognized testto meet the standard. This makes perfect sense in the light of the findings when physicians were solicited to take a test in ECG interpretation. Of the physician who felt they would pass such a test, • 70% of all non-Internal Medicine specialists failed, • 49% of all Internal Medicine specialists failed, • 9% of all Cardiologists failed!On top of that bad news, up to 30% of all computerized interpretations fail. Consider the fact that up to 11% of ECG interpretation errors are associated with morbidity and mortality. With an aging population that will require even more use of ECGs, this puts meeting the standardof care in a whole new light.
