Halfdan Petursson

 

Halfdan Petursson is an Icelandic medical doctor employed as a researcher at the Research Unit of General Practice (Allmennmedisinsk forskningsenhet), Department of Public Health and General Practice (Institutt for samfunnsmedisin), NTNU. He received his PhD degree 16/3 2012 and his research field is prevention of cardiovascular disease in general practice.

Background

Candidatus Medicinae from the University of Iceland, Faculty of Medicine 2008
Medical licence in Iceland and Norway 2009
Philosophiae Doctor in Public health from NTNU, Faculty of Medicine 2012

PhD thesis

The Validity and Relevance of International Cardiovascular Disease Prevention Guidelines for General Practice

The aim of this PhD project was to further develop an evidence based understanding of what implementation of internationally renowned clinical guidelines in the field of cardiovascular disease (CVD) prevention can mean in a Norwegian context, with emphasis on the role of general practitioners and organization of primary health care services. This included estimating the prevalence of individuals "at risk" for CVD, and the potential workload associated with the recommended treatment measures; revising the predictive ability of the guidelines´ estimates of CVD risk; and reflecting upon practical and ethical questions regarding clinical guidelines and the treatment of risk factors.

Publications in Peer-Reviewed Journals

• Petursson H, Getz L, Sigurdsson JA, Hetlevik I. Can individuals with a significant risk for cardiovascular disease be adequately identified by combination of several risk factors? Modelling study based on the Norwegian HUNT 2 population. J Eval Clin Pract. 2009;15:103-9. (Available online: http://www3.interscience.wiley.com/cgi-bin/fulltext/122200205/HTMLSTART)
• Petursson H, Getz L, Sigurdsson JA, Hetlevik I. Current European guidelines for management of arterial hypertension: Are they adequate for use in primary care? Modelling study based on the Norwegian HUNT 2 population. BMC Family Practice 2009;10:70. (Available online: http://www.biomedcentral.com/1471-2296/10/70)
• Petursson H, Sigurdsson JA, Bengtsson C, Nilsen TIL, Getz L. Is the use of cholesterol in mortality risk algorithms in clinical guidelines valid? Ten years prospective data from the Norwegian HUNT 2 study. J Eval Clin Pract 2012;18(1):159-168. (Available online: http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1365-2753.2011.01767.x/full)
• Petursson H, Sigurdsson JA, Bengtsson C, Nilsen TIL, Getz L. Body configuration as a predictor of mortality: Comparison of five anthropometric measures in a 12 year follow-up of the Norwegian HUNT 2 study. PLoS ONE 2011;6(10):e26621. (Available online: http://www.plosone.org/article/info%3Adoi%2F10.1371%2Fjournal.pone.0026621)
• Getz L, Kirkengen AL, Petursson H, Sigurdsson JA. The royal road to healing: a bit of a saga. BMJ 2011;343:d7826. (Available online: http://www.bmj.com/cgi/pmidlookup?view=long&pmid=22184559)

Material & Methods

• HUNT 2
• Descriptive quantitative statistics
• Cox regression analysis
• SPSS
• Stata