Introduction
Diabetes is a chronic condition development that disrupts an individual’s lifestyle, increases the economic cost of healthcare, and severely influences national mortality rates. In the United States, more than 34% of the adult population have pre-diabetes; 10% are diagnosed with it, making the disease a significant public health challenge (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 2020). Thus, utilizing chronic disease care and developing workable management strategies is vital for sustainable public health improvement. Governmental and healthcare sectors have various programs to address diabetes treatment and prevention, and practitioners must help them by delivering better services for the affected individuals (Del Valle & McDonnell, 2018). This paper aims to describe the application of the chronic disease care model to address diabetes and explore the challenges that limit the ability to provide high-quality treatment.
Chronic Care Model Application for Diabetes
The chronic care model merges the elements of the national healthcare system to address a disease, decrease the incidence rates, and develop workable and cost-efficient treatment strategies. The framework includes community, self-management, delivery of care, clinical informational systems, and decision-making support (Nash et al., 2021). Applied to diabetes, the chronic care model must consider that affected individuals need daily treatment and can have complications causing other diseases. Consequently, the community element can address the educational aspect, promoting prevention measures, and distributing proper support strategies (Bongaerts et al., 2017). Besides, policymakers can help address the chronic care issues through improving local medication supply or establishing relevant social programs. According to the model, health systems must provide high-quality services, prepared practitioners, and resources necessary for managing diabetes (Bongaerts et al., 2017). The combination of community and healthcare organizations’ efforts is appropriate for addressing diabetes care because if exercised effectively, they can lead to a well-aware individual with correct self-management habits.
Current Challenges of Diabetes Management
Diabetes remains a major healthcare problem because populations lack knowledge about the prevention and recognition of pre-diabetes conditions. Furthermore, the affected individuals experience difficulties in disease management due to its costs and complicated treatment approaches. The chronic care model for diabetes addresses the importance of self-regulation, yet the challenges, such as unavailable medication and lack of communication with a patient, limit the ability of facilities to deliver effective quality healthcare. Indeed, the first issue requires attention from the government and economic regulators because, with the growing number of the affected population, the demand for Insulin, Metformin, and Glipizide will increase (Del Valle & McDonnell, 2018). The difficulty accessing the medication for the poor populations limits the ability to deliver effective quality care.
The lack of proper communication is another challenge interrupting the high-quality healthcare delivery for the affected population. Nursing practitioners can overcome the problem by delivering effective patient education and helping the patients improve their self-management habits (Dossey et al., 2019). Moreover, the basics about diabetes, symptoms, prevention and treatment must be accessible for everyone, and healthcare organizations need to create websites, phone hotlines, and hand-outs to timely provide their clients with helpful information.
Conclusion
Diabetes is one of the main recent public health challenges with the increasing number of affected populations. The disease requires daily self-management to help an individual maintain appropriate conditions and be able to live normally. The chronic care model for diabetes must primarily address patient education and self-regulation to achieve sustainable results. Challenges such as the medication’s inaccessibility and the lack of proper communication about the disease limit the healthcare systems’ ability to deliver high-quality services. Consequently, resolving the problems through governmental intervention and patient education improvement can help address diabetes more effectively.
References
Bongaerts, B. W., Müssig, K., Wens, J., Lang, C., Schwarz, P., Roden, M., & Rathmann, W. (2017). Effectiveness of chronic care models for the management of type 2 diabetes mellitus in Europe: a systematic review and meta-analysis. BMJ Open, 7(3), e013076. Web.
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. (2020). National diabetes statistics report. Web.
Del Valle, K. L., & McDonnell, M. E. (2018). Chronic care management services for complex diabetes management: a practical overview. Current Diabetes Reports, 18(12), 1-8. Web.
Dossey, B. M., Rosa, W. E., & Beck, D.-M. (2019). Nursing and the sustainable development goals: From Nightingale to now. American Journal of Nursing, 119(5), 44–49. Web.
Nash, D. B., Skoufalos, A., Fabius, R. J. & Oglesby, W. H. (2021). Population health: Creating a culture of wellness (3rd ed.). Jones & Bartlett Learning.