Twelve-year follow-up of a population-based primary care diabetes program in Israel

To describe the effects of a long-term intervention including 72% of Israeli diabetes patients, aimed at improving diabetes care in a primary care setting.

A retrospective periodic population-based cross-sectional study.

Two health maintenance organizations (HMOs) in Israel-intervention and control.

All diagnosed diabetes patients enrolled in both HMOs.

Multifaceted interventions directed toward primary care providers, including educational strategies, registries, clinical pathways, care quality indicators, computerized reminders and feedback.

Performance in quality indicators, compared with an HMO that did not implement an intervention program.

The prevalence of diabetes increased from 20.2/1000 in 1995 to 63.7/1000 in 2007. Annual testing of hemoglobin A1c (HbA1c) rose from 22% in 1995 to 88% in 2007. The corresponding figures for low-density lipoprotein (LDL) were 23 and 89%, and for microalbumin 10 and 69%, respectively (P< 0.0001 for all comparisons). The proportion of HbA1c ≤7% increased from 10 to 53%, while HbA1c >9% decreased from 40 to 13% (P< 0.0001). Good control of LDL ≤100 mg/dl increased from 26 to 59% (P< 0.0001). In the comparison HMO, subtle increases in the performance of HbA1c (55.8-63.4%), LDL (59.7-67.0%) and microalbumin (55.1-67.6%) were noted between 2005 and 2007, respectively. HbA1c ≤7 and >9% remained stable (36 and 13%, respectively), while LDL ≤100 mg/dl rose from 38 to 44% in the control HMO.

A community-oriented program for diabetes care led to improvements in performance of tests, as well as control of HbA1c and LDL among 72% of diabetes patients in Israel.