FRONTLINE: DIABETES—SUPPLEMENTING EDUCATION AND QUALITY IMPROVEMENT IN FAMILY MEDICINE RESIDENCY TRAINING
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* Peter J. Carek
* John B. Buse

In 2004, Frontline: Diabetes was created by the Association of Family Medicine Residency Directors (AFMRD) with an unrestricted educational grant from Novo Nordisk, as an educational forum used to provide family medicine residents the opportunity to expand their knowledge and patient care skills in the area of diabetes mellitus. This program combines resident education and educational research. Frontline: Diabetes is a project that offers residents a novel, integrated approach to the prevention and treatment of diabetes. Participants learn about current standards of diabetes care, nutritional counseling, educational needs, and relevant referral resources from a multidisciplinary team of family physicians, endocrinologists, dieticians, and certified diabetic educators.

To augment this educational experience, participants will be provided instruction regarding the principles of quality improvement and its integration into their medical practice. As an introduction to quality improvement, participants complete an online, interactive primer entitled, “Quality Improvement and Beyond: Achieving Excellence in Health Care.”

In addition to attending workshops, residents are asked to participate in a research component of the project to determine the effectiveness of this educational format. Participating residents complete pre- and post-tests as well as conduct a limited chart review using nationally recognized quality indictors of diabetes care before and after attending the workshop.

Since its introduction, 45 individual seminars have been conducted throughout the United States with over 1,811 family medicine residents from 290 different residency programs participating. Overall, the impact of this educational endeavor on participants’ knowledge base and practice patterns has been extremely positive. Based on the results to date, the average test score regarding knowledge base about diabetes mellitus has improved by 10% and an evaluation of quality indicators has demonstrated an average improvement of 33% following participation in a workshop. Furthermore, the residents have reported an extremely high level of satisfaction with this program.

The Frontline: Diabetes project can assist family medicine program directors as they incorporate the core competencies of the Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education into their residency programs. Besides the acquisition of medical knowledge regarding diabetes mellitus, residents will participate in activities that promote practice-based learning and improvement and system-based learning.

Based upon the preliminary results and the feedback provided by participating family medicine residents, the Frontline: Diabetes project has been a very successful educational program that is significantly impacting a common health care issue.

*   © 2008 Annals of Family Medicine, Inc.