Diabetes / Chronic Kidney Disease Learning Collaborative

The goals for the quality improvement project “Implementing Primary Care and Pharmacy Strategies to Improve Care for Patients with Diabetes” are to help primary care practices to improve the screening and treatment of patients with diabetes, and to detect diabetes-related eye and kidney disease earlier in patients and to help patients improve glycemic control. The January Diabetes Learning Collaborative provided an opportunity for the seven participating practices to discuss what they learned from performing chart audits, reviewing their Q1 and Q2 performance data on screening for eye exams, kidney health evaluation and glycemic control as well as share their updated performance plans including successes, barriers and next steps. Steve Kogut, PhD, MBA, RPh discussed results and lessons learned from the baseline practice survey, outlining barriers to each screening and factors associated with incomplete exams and evaluations. Finally, Kelley Sanzen, PharmD, PAHM, CDOE, Clinical Pharmacist, Pharmacy Quality Improvement Facilitator, presented on academic detailing, highlighting its importance to building relationships, improve clinician and patient knowledge, and promoting evidence-based medicine. The presentation also demonstrated elements of success, introduction examples, and strategies for handling objections, wrapping up with a short brainstorming session. The seven participating practices in this project are continuing to do great work! Funding for this project is provided by UnitedHealthcare and RIDOH.