In a data-rich piece, Diabetes in Control publisher, Steve Freed, offers a discussion of how better diabetes control can impact cost, quality of life and mortality. This article and its references offer advocates citable data on diabetes care and cost savings. See the articles for details.
The paper concludes:
These factors discussed lead us back to the former topics covered that can help us slowly end this diabetes epidemic. If we are consistent with our patients and maintain continuity of care we can reduce many diabetes-related events and medical costs. This means: regular preventive care and guidance on self-management of the disease; coaching by health care providers to relay the importance of nutrition, exercise and consistent health regimens that should be followed; and diabetes education assistance to show the patient that there are healthier alternatives that can be budget friendly and improve quality of life. We cannot focus on one aspect being superior to the other when trying to control type 2 diabetes, but merely put everything together and treat this disease with a synergistic approach.
Practice Pearls:
- Reducing medical cost of a diabetic patient depends not only the the individual patients but also the consistency and continuity of their healthcare providers that are there to guide them.
- Education on the adherence to the proper medication regimen, lifestyle modifications such as exercise and diet, by the healthcare providers is crucial to preventing unnecessary medical costs.
- One factor contributing to the diabetes epidemic is limited access to healthy food choices because of lack of guidance or knowledge for proper diabetes control.