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ADMS Enabled Education & Social Networking for Type 2 Diabetes

Population

Adults ages 27 – 62 in Southeast USA with Type 2 Diabetes (employees of BellSouth Corp, acquired by ATT in 2007)


Results
  • Average A1c reduction, the gold standard for measuring a patient's control of their diabetes, of nearly a full point when comparing the treatment group vs control group (- 0.9 Treatment vs.- 0.1 Control)
  • During the course of the one year program, participants in the treatment group demonstrating blood sugar control at or below the ADA recommended target of %A1c of 7.0 went from only 48% of the participants at the beginning of the pilot to 72% at or below the ADA recommended A1c target at the conclusion.Whereas, the control group participants saw no change in the percentage of participants at or below the ADA's recommended target.
  • Participant satisfaction in excess of 95% in the treatment group
  • Indicated that patient blood glucose self-test frequency may not be directly related to effective blood sugar control as a marker of by itself
  • Proved that a cost effective and highly scalable technology driven program can be an effective program on its own or as an adjunct service to labor intensive call center disease management programs
  • BellSouth CIO joined Diabetech Advisory Board following close of the ATT acquisition

Description

As a reaction to less than satisfactory results being delivered by BellSouth's traditional call center based disease management program, Diabetech was retained to apply its automated education & management services to provide a completely turn key program including participant recruitment, enrollment, fulfillment, active monitoring & education, analysis and feedback to a patient-centric team of lay supporters (aka - social network).The program also included a one-time $75 incentive to facilitate recruiting (most participants commented that the incentive was unnecessary).


Clinic Partner
No regional providers of diabetes care were involved in the design and management. Rather, participants were encouraged to invite their own providers to join them in this program as a stakeholder with only infrequent risk based exception reporting (very few of the participant's physicians agreed to be included within the formal program). However, several of the program participants worked on their own with their physicians using the tools and information made available from the program during their standard office visit with their local provider.

 

Investigators & Consultants

 

Kimberly Mason CDE, Barbara Anderson, PhD, Stephen Ponder MD, CDE, Eric Link and Kevin McMahon

Trial Sponsor

Technology

ADMS configured to emphasize education for type 2 diabetes (ie - blood glucose checking, Medical Nutrition Therapy, activity), GlucoMON prototype wireless blood sugar transmission device, interactive text messaging / email, online blood sugar charting for both individual and peer group, established care management models around patient-centric teams, social network education and prompts to encourage and/or reinforce the participant based on clinical algorithms to determine status.

Education

Skills assessments, Behavioral assessments, Quicktips dynamic education, monthly interactive surveys

Duration

May 2006 – April 2007


Participants


  • 35 (25 treatment / 10 control)
  • Entry A1c treatment group [7.4 (+/-6.7)] vs control group [7.2 (+/-3.8)]

Outcomes

A1c, Frequency of SMBG, Patient satisfaction


Publication Status

Presented at 67th Annual ADA Scientific Sessions Symposium; "Beyond Health Care Practitioners - Diabetes Health Care Extenders" in a presentation entitled,"Beyond Websites: Mobile Diagnostics, Rules Engines and Social Networks for Developing Smart Patients". The symposium was chaired by Satish Garg MD (Barbara Davis Center) with additional presentations by Lois Janovic MD (Sansum Diabetes Center), Meyer Davidson MD (Drew University) and Steven Edelman MD (UCSD).

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