The purpose of this quality improvement project was to implement and evaluate if a virtual diabetes self-management education (DSME) pathway is a cost-effective intervention in improving glycemic control for adult patients with type 2 diabetes (T2D). A one group pre and post-test design was utilized. Total of 41 participants completed the 4-week diabetes self-management pathway. The virtual curriculum integrated spaced education through a mobile health app called Calcium©. Primary outcome measure was change in HbA1c levels three months after intervention. Wilcoxon signed-rank test was used to analyze the difference before and after the DSME intervention. There was a 1.6% mean reduction of HbA1c levels (P=<0.001). There was also statistically significant improvement of other metabolic markers including blood sugar averages, body weight, BMI and systolic blood pressure (P=<0.005). Mean comparison of HbA1c shows that those who significantly utilized the virtual pathway were found to have greater improvement in glycemic control (-2.55% vs -0.43%). This quality improvement project implemented evidence-based interventions to improve patient outcomes, lower healthcare cost and hopefully influence health care policy. Moving this body of knowledge forward with attention to developing and implementing DSME initiatives and exploring novel practice models open doors for building this body of evidence further.
E.P.Soliman: None.
