The Pharmacist's Role in Continuity of Care in Type 2 Diabetes: An Evaluation of a Model

摘要

Background: Evidence suggests that many patients with type 2 diabetes are not achieving current evidence-based therapeutic targets.Objective: To compare the impact of a clinic-only versus continuity-of-care model on clinical and humanistic outcomes of patients with type 2 diabetes.Methods: One hundred eighteen patients were recruited from 2 diabetes clinics and assigned to a clinic-only or continuity-of-care group. The clinic-only patients were assessed by the clinic pharmacist at the initial visit and attended their usual pharmacy until the follow-up clinic visit 6 months later. The continuity-of-care patients were referred to one of 20 participating pharmacies for ongoing care over 6 months. The evaluation used a repeated measures design and compared the clinic-only with the continuity-of-care groups.