Vermedx® Programs for Public Health Agencies
Overview
Vermedx® has gained national attention for creating unique programs to support large public health agencies. The New York City and San Antonio Departments of Health have enlisted us to apply the “front end” of the Vermedx® diabetes management technology to provide them with the epidemiologic tools needed to measure and monitor the scope and nature of the diabetes epidemic within their populations, and to be the foundation for future outreach programs.
We are actively responding to inquiries from other state and municipal Health Departments, and from directors of Centers for Disease Control State Diabetes Prevention programs about developing similar programs for them.
At the request of officials of the Centers for Disease Control, we will be hosting a Panel Session at the 2008 CDC Assessment Conference, August 18-20, in Atlanta, GA. This Session will enable both policy officials and epidemiologists from across the country to learn directly from peers in New York City and San Antonio, and from other leaders in population based chronic disease management, how laboratory-based surveillance is assisting them in obtaining and analyzing data that are central to their efforts to improve outcomes and reduce treatment costs for their populations.
Background
The escalation in diabetes prevalence in major metropolitan areas is widely recognized as both a social tragedy on a huge scale, and an unacceptable drain on the financial and personnel resources of municipal, state, and regional public health agencies.
Departments of Health and Chronic Disease Prevention agencies have come to recognize that traditional approaches have limited value. Senior policy officials and epidemiologists see top line trend data "going south", but these officials lack the tools to comprehensively gather, and objectively assess what is happening within their diabetes patient populations. They therefore lack the crucial baseline for creating and executing outreach programs that will effectively involve patients and providers to improve health outcomes and clinical process while achieving significant treatment cost savings for the system.
Creating the Foundation
Our work with public health agencies has identified a three-stage Strategy for achieving their objectives:
- Data collection and ongoing analysis on the entire diabetes population served by the Agency. These data must be tailored to the specific requirements of the epidemiologists who need to segment it according to multiple geographic and demographic variables, from a user-friendly source.
- Creation of a detailed Outreach Strategy that takes into account local patient characteristics and provider and is tailored to the available communication channels.
- Implementation and intensive monitoring of the Outreach Strategy, following carefully orchestrated preparation initiatives for providers, testing laboratories, and other local constituencies.
Data Collection and Analysis: The Vermedx® Diabetes Registry
Chronic disease registries have existed for decades, but they do not collect, format, or report critical data in a manner that provides epidemiologists and policy makers with the data they need to successfully measure and monitor disease prevalence.
We have created unique Diabetes Registries and unique reporting programs for the New York City Department of Health and the San Antonio Metropolitan Health Department. Each Registry and Report Program is customized according to the priorities of each Department. Each Registry can provide:
- Current diabetes health status for the entire populations and sub-populations defined by age, sex, geography, provider, etc.
- Trends of health status over time for the entire population and sub-populations
- Maps of health status
- Combined data from other sources, such as claims information, census, surveys, and hospital discharges
Creation of an Outreach Strategy
The Vermedx Team works closely with agency officials to understand both concerns and capabilities of local provider organizations, payers, testing labs, and patient advocacy groups. We then apply lessons learned over the course of more than five years of experience with Outreach programs to customize an initiative that is compatible with an agency's operational, financial, and local political realities.
Implementing and Monitoring an Outreach Strategy
Our Team can assist in Outreach implementation either through active ongoing participation, or on an "as needed consulting" basis. As the goals and resources of every public health agency are unique and specific, we tailor our role to those needs.