Developing, Implementing and Evaluating a Clinical Care Pathway for NAFLD/NASH in Primary Care

Non-alcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD) is the most common chronic liver condition, posing a significant burden worldwide. Although primary care professionals are central to the identification and management of NAFLD, they seldom address the risk of advanced fibrosis in patients with frequent NAFLD comorbid conditions, including obesity, diabetes and dyslipidemia. NAFLD can progress to non-alcoholic steatohepatitis (NASH), for which no approved therapies or coordinated care are available. Furthermore, although NAFLD/NASH and the associated risk factors are preventable and controllable, research indicates that public awareness of the disease is significantly low.

Strong collaboration between primary care and specialty care is necessary for the effective diagnosis and management of NAFLD/NASH. There is, as such, a need to establish and evaluate easily implementable, multidisciplinary, patient-centered models to enhance primary care screening and linkages to specialty care for high-risk NAFLD/NASH patients, to inform policies and drive decisions.

The overall aim of this project is to develop and evaluate an integrated, multidisciplinary, patient-centered model of care for NAFLD/NASH screening, diagnosis and linkage to specialty care and translate learnings into a harmonized practice guideline for primary care.

The model will combine the latest evidence-based practice and risk communication practices. The project will provide primary care professionals with a state-of-the-art training program and easily implementable approaches for establishing patient care pathways and integrated actions between primary care professionals and specialists. All project activities will be tailored by local experts and implemented in diverse European settings in Crete, Greece, Barcelona, Spain and Maastricht, the Netherlands.