[New way in diabetes prevention].
About 180 million people are affected by Diabetes mellitus all over the world and 1.7 million in Italy; it has been rated that numbers could double within 20 years. In Italy, diabetes is the third reason of chronic renal insufficiency, the second of blindness, and it increases cardiovascular mortality by 30%. In Apulia Region, there are about 17,000 hospitalizations/year because of diabetes (rate = 6.4 x 1,000 inhabitants, average age = 60 years) and this is the second disease reported in case of a cerebral and/or cardiovascular ischemic events. During 1995, general practitioners (GP) and diabetes specialists (DS) stared to create a strategy to improve the care of diabetic patients. Integrated care, patients' involvement and the use of shared therapeutic protocols were the main characteristics of this strategy. In 2005, started from these points, the "Italian National Active Prevention Plane" redefined a strategy based on the use of electronic database and the systematic updating of GP and DS. The better work organization, the costs reduction and the care improvement are the main benefits expected by the new strategy while the lack of short term results is the main difficulty met during the unrolling of the Plane. Short term results could be: a quick identification of patients in general and bad aided patients in particular and a discovery of the complications in the right time. The hygienist, with his cultural structure, is the best medical figure to organize the activities of Plane and pledge the results.
Germinario
C
C
Osservatorio Epidemiologico Regione Puglia.
Martinelli
D
D
D002985:Clinical Protocols; D003469:Culture; D016208:Databases, Factual; D003920:Diabetes Mellitus / Q000517:prevention & control*; D001330:Electronic Data Processing; D006801:Humans; D007558:Italy; D011314:Preventive Health Services / Q000458:organization & administration* / Q000639:trends