Focus on Diabetes

A Joint Message From NCQA and Pfizer 

The National Committee for Quality Assurance (NCQA) and Pfizer Inc are pleased to present the third edition of Quality Profiles: The Leadership Series Focus on Diabetes. Concerns about the quality of chronic disease care and rising health care costs affect everyone involved in the delivery of health care. Most NCQA-Accredited health care organizations have been actively seeking ways to collaborate with clinicians and patients to enhance, recognize, and reward quality care under these circumstances. NCQA and Pfizer hope that the background analysis and models of successful programs in Quality Profiles: Focus on Diabetes will help plans and physicians in their efforts to optimize care.

Quality Profiles: The Leadership Series Focus on Diabetes provides an in-depth discussion of existing quality issues and barriers to quality improvement (QI) with regard to a specific clinical area. When organizations begin a QI initiative, they often have to spend considerable time and resources to determine the most efficient and meaningful ways to target appropriate patients, change practitioner and patient behavior, and measure the results of their efforts. The purpose of Quality Profiles: Focus on Diabetes is to provide organizations with a single publication that summarizes the latest research regarding diabetes prevention and care, reviews existing gaps and barriers to care, and provides examples and case studies of QI programs demonstrated to be successful.

Diabetes has long been recognized for its significant impact on overall health status, productivity, and health care costs, but because of the increasing prevalence of type 2 diabetes, its personal, social, and economic impact is expected to become even more profound. As you will learn, modest changes in diet, physical activity, and when applicable, smoking cessation, can prevent or delay the onset of type 2 diabetes and its complications. Diabetes management requires a focus on the present controlling blood glucose and cholesterol levels, and managing hypertension while keeping an eye on the future by screening for and treating complications. These efforts require a team approach and an actively involved patient. This issue of Quality Profiles describes several QI initiatives that illustrate how health plans and employers, working with people with diabetes and the medical community, are improving the quality of diabetes care.

It is the sincere hope of NCQA and Pfizer that Quality Profiles: Focus on Diabetes will help health care organizations and payers overcome the barriers to quality diabetes care and create successful QI programs focusing on diabetes management. These programs help the many patients with diabetes successfully manage their disease and live healthier, more productive lives.