A new organisation at the primary level, called model practices, introduces a 0.5 full-time equivalent nurse practitioner as a regular member of the team. Nurse practitioners are in charge of ...registers of chronic patients, and implement an active approach into medical care. Selected quality indicators define the quality of management. The majority of studies confirm the effectiveness of the extended team in the quality of care, which is similar or improved when compared to care performed by the physician alone. The aim of the study is to compare the quality of management of patients with diabetes mellitus type 2 before and after the introduction of model practices.
A cohort retrospective study was based on medical records from three practices. Process quality indicators, such as regularity of HbA1c measurement, blood pressure measurement, foot exam, referral to eye exam, performance of yearly laboratory tests and HbA1c level before and after the introduction of model practices were compared.
The final sample consisted of 132 patients, whose diabetes care was exclusively performed at the primary care level. The process of care has significantly improved after the delivery of model practices. The most outstanding is the increase of foot exam and HbA1c testing. We could not prove better glycaemic control (p>0.1). Nevertheless, the proposed benchmark for the suggested quality process and outcome indicators were mostly exceeded in this cohort.
The introduction of a nurse into the team improves the process quality of care. Benchmarks for quality indicators are obtainable. Better outcomes of care need further confirmation.
Hypoglycaemia is the major barrier for glycaemic target achievement in patients treated with insulin. The aim of the present study was to investigate real-world incidence and predictors of ...hypoglycaemia in insulin-treated patients.
More than 300 consecutive patients with type 1 or type 2 diabetes treated with insulin were enrolled during regular out-patient visits from 36 diabetes practices throughout the whole country. They completed a comprehensive questionnaire on hypoglycaemia knowledge, awareness, and incidence in the last month and last six months. In addition, in the prospective part, patients recorded incidence of hypoglycaemic events using a special diary prospectively on a daily basis, through 4 weeks.
At least one hypoglycaemic event was self-reported in 84.1%, and 56.4% of patients with type 1 and type 2 diabetes, respectively, during the prospective period of 4 weeks. 43.4% and 26.2% of patients with type 1 and type 2 diabetes, respectively, experienced a nocturnal hypoglycaemic event. In the same time-period, severe hypoglycaemia was experienced by 15.9% and 7.1% of patients with type 1 and type 2 diabetes, respectively. Lower glycated haemoglobin was not a significant predictor of hypoglycaemia.
Rates of self-reported hypoglycaemia in patients treated with insulin in the largest and most comprehensive study in Slovenia so far are higher than reported from randomised control trials, but comparable to data from observational studies. Hypoglycaemia incidence was high even with high glycated haemoglobin values.
Diabetes prevalence and costs are rising on aglobal scale. Therefore, it is necessary to periodically conduct cost studies for assessing the healthcare burden impact. In Slovenia, the last type 2 ...diabetes cost assessment was conducted in 2006, not including all diabetes complication costs. The aim of this study was to revise, update and compare to previously published datadirect healthcare costs of type 2 diabetes in Slovenia with additional complications costs consideration.
The study was performed from the healthcare payer perspective using the bottom-up approach, was prevalence based and estimated direct medical costs.
We estimated total yearly direct medical costs of type 2 diabetes in Slovenia to 99,120,419 euro with annual per capita costs of 834.70 euro. The highest cost shares were attributed to cardiovascular complication costs (21,683,919 euro), diabetes co-medication (20,977,269 euro) and diabetes treatment medication (18,505,015 euro). Highest yearly costs per complication (all cases, all occurrences) were estimated for dialysis I and III (9,162,635 euro), stroke first year costs (4,951,306 euro) and congestive heart failure first year costs (4,879,533 euro). Yearly per one patient, the complication costs were highest for kidney transplantation, followed by dialysis I and III (78,621.25 euro and 36,797.73 euro)
In comparison to the costs published in the literature before, our estimated total yearly direct medical costs were comparable, although annual per capita costs were assessed lower than elsewhere. Further, regarding the complication costs estimations, our assessed expenses were comparable to those published in other countries.
Prevalenca in stroški sladkorne bolezni v globalnem merilu naraščajo. Zato je treba redno izvajati študije stroškovnega bremena za oceno vpliva na zdravstvo. V Sloveniji je bila zadnja študija bremena sladkorne bolezni tipa 2 izvedena leta 2006 in ni upoštevala vseh stroškov diabetičnih zapletov. Cilj te raziskave je bil pregledati, posodobiti in primerjati s prej objavljenimi podatki neposredne medicinske stroške sladkorne bolezni tipa 2 v Sloveniji z upoštevanjem dodatnih diabetičnih zapletov.
Študija je bila izvedena z vidika plačnika zdravstvenega varstva; uporabljen je bil pristop »bottom-up« s prevalenčnim vidikom in ocenjeni so bili neposredni medicinski stroški.
Letne neposredne medicinske stroške sladkorne bolezni tipa 2 smo ocenili na 99,120.419 evrov z 834,70 evra letnih stroškov na osebo. Najvišji delež je pripadal stroškom srčno-žilnih zapletov (21,683.919 evrov), stroškom sočasno uporabljenih zdravil (20,977.269 evrov) in stroškom antidiabetikov in inzulinov (18,505.015 evrov). Najvišji letni stroški za diabetični zaplet (vse ponovitve in vsi primeri) so bili ocenjeni za dializo I in III (9,162.635 evrov), prvo leto možganske kapi (4.951.306 evrov) in prvo leto srčnega popuščanja (4,879.533 evrov). Najdražji zaplet sladkorne bolezni (letno na posameznega bolnika) je bila transplantacija ledvic (78.621,25 evra), sledili sta dializa I in III (letno na osebo 36.797,73 evra).
V primerjavi s prej objavljenimi podatki v literaturi so v tej raziskavi objavljeni letni neposredni medicinski stroški primerljivi, čeprav so letni stroški na osebo ocenjeni nižje kot drugje. Prav tako so stroškovne ocene posameznih zapletov sladkorne bolezni primerljive s prej objavljenimi.
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