Utilisation of health services by diabetic patients. 1: The district nursing service.
In 1981 the district nursing service in Christchurch was making 590 home visits, on a weekly basis, to 73 patients for the purposes of drawing up and injecting insulin. This was 13.9% of their total workload. Through a programme of education many were able to manage the injection technique totally. In other cases the provision of pre-loaded syringes permitted less frequent attendance by the district nurse. At survey, one year later, the patient numbers visited had fallen to 46, and the number of weekly visits had been reduced by half. These results show the benefits of research programmes, aimed at evaluation of health delivery, with a view to improving their efficiency and reducing their cost.
D000368:Aged; D003920:Diabetes Mellitus / Q000628:therapy*; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D009739:Nursing Services