AAPA Works to Improve Diabetes Care at September NDEP Meeting
Up to this point, much of the focus on diabetes care has been dealing with macrovascular complications like heart disease and stroke. Recently AAPA — which is both a member of the steering committee and workgroup — attended the Health Care Professional Workgroup meeting sponsored by the National Diabetes Education Program (NDEP). There, members discussed microvascular complications, which affect the eyes, nerves and kidneys, and then developed messages about how to prevent and control those kinds of complications.
Another focus of last month’s meeting in Washington, D.C. was reviewing resources available to clinicians to help them better manage their patients with diabetes. Among them is a new revised Web site, Making Systems Changes for Better Diabetes Care, which provides information, models, links, resources and tools to help clinicians assess needs for systems change, develop strategic plans, implement tools for action and evaluate the systems change process.
Also, AAPA was asked to review a document on team care, which concludes that diabetes care can be vastly improved by using this approach. The workgroup met with the Pharmacy, Podiatry, Optometry, and Dentistry (PPOD) work group to talk about ways to improve referrals among health care providers. Plus, NDEP announced they will be launching a campaign in November on Controlling Your Diabetes.
Doug Scott, This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it
