University of New Mexico
Diabetes mellitus is a chronic condition that affects the body's ability to process sugar effectively, which over time can increase the risk of heart disease, high blood pressure, and kidney damage. Other chronic conditions include high cholesterol, obesity, and depression. Persons with diabetes mellitus and multiple chronic conditions (DMMC) face higher risks of losing physical or mental function, experiencing other chronic conditions, and death. Most of the residents of New Mexico (NM) belong to groups at risk for developing DMMC. Finding quality healthcare is a key factor, as NM also ranks among the largest, poorest, and most rural states. Primary care providers (PCPs) most often treat DMMC patients, but healthcare teams can lack confidence in managing these complex patients and struggle to keep up with recommended guidelines. This Project ECHO model (ECHO) for DMMC, a telehealth intervention for healthcare teams, can lead to lower blood sugar levels in DMMC patients being treated at NM primary care clinics. ECHO is a "telementoring" program that trains healthcare teams to provide specialized medical care at their local clinics. This is done by connecting healthcare teams with specialist mentors at academic medical centers through videoconferencing sessions. During ECHO program sessions, groups of healthcare teams hear lectures on key topics in DMMC care from experts, and then give presentations of anonymous patient cases by a healthcare teams for discussion and to receive recommendations. This clinical pragmatic trial aims to learn if the intervention will improve patient blood sugar levels in persons with DMMC who are being treated at selected health clinic sites throughout New Mexico. The study aims to answer: * Whether a 0.5% drop in HbA1c on average can be achieved in the group whose healthcare teams are receiving the ECHO intervention compared to the comparator group, whose providers will not receive the intervention. * Whether the rate of an individual's HbA1c was greater than 8.5% at the baseline will be reduced by 15% at the end of the intervention. Researchers will compare health data for patients empaneled to healthcare teams in the study and the usual care comparator group both before and after the intervention period to see whether the ECHO model has a positive influence on test results.
Persons with diabetes mellitus and multiple (2+) chronic conditions (DMMC) are at increased risk of functional decline, lower quality of life, and mortality. In a state ranked among the largest, poorest, and most rural, a high proportion of the diverse residents of New Mexico (NM) belong to groups at risk for developing DMMC. Lack of access to quality healthcare is a key risk factor. Healthcare teams at Federally Qualified Health Centers (FQHCs) in medically underserved areas must have knowledge of, and be able to implement, evidence-based management guidelines to address disease complexity su…
Inclusion criteria: * Twenty PMS sites with the highest patient volume. * All members of the PMS sites (participants) healthcare teams between 18 and 89 years of age, all genders, and all ethnicities. Exclusion criteria: * There is no exclusion criteria.
For the intervention, an 18-month ECHO program of weekly videoconference sessions will mentor healthcare teams on complex care strategies for patients with DMMC, emphasizing evidence-based best practices related to common chronic conditions (e.g., diabetes, CKD, hypertension, hyperlipidemia and depression). Mentorship will be provided by a multidisciplinary team of experts including a patient representative, diabetes educator, endocrinologist, psychiatrist, a nephrologist/kidney disease and hypertension specialist, a clinical pharmacist, and a cardiology consultant. Each session will consist of a didactic presentation, de-identified patient case presentations, and questions and discussion.
The comparator will consist of 10 PMS FQHC clinics with healthcare teams practicing usual care according to PMS standard practices during the 18 months of the intervention arm.