Understanding delays in chronic limb-threatening ischaemia care: Application of the theoretical domains framework to identify factors affecting primary care clinicians' referral behaviours.

INTRODUCTION: Patients in the community with suspected Chronic limb-threatening ischaemia (CLTI) should be urgently referred to vascular services for investigation and management. The Theoretical Domains Framework (TDF) allows identification of influences on health professional behaviour in order to inform future interventions. Here, the TDF is used to explore primary care clinicians' behaviours with regards to recognition and referral of CLTI.

METHODS: Semi-structured interviews were conducted with 20 podiatrists, nurses and general practitioners in primary care. Directed content analysis was performed according to the framework method. Utterances were coded to TDF domains, and belief statements were defined by grouping similar utterances. Relevance of domains was confirmed according to belief frequency, presence of conflicting beliefs and the content of the beliefs indicating relevance.

RESULTS: Nine TDF domains were identified as relevant to primary care clinicians: Knowledge, Environmental context and resources, Memory, Decision and attention processes, Beliefs about capabilities, Skills, Emotions, Reinforcement and Behavioural regulation. Relationships across domains were identified, including how primary care clinician confidence and working in a highly pressurized environment can affect behaviour.

CONCLUSION: We have identified key barriers and enablers to timely recognition and referral behaviour. These beliefs identify targets for theory-driven behaviour change interventions to reduce delays in CLTI pathways.