Diabetes Interprofessional Medical Education

 

The department has prided itself on its leadership in creating an interprofessional community program that focuses on diabetes (DIME). The current interprofessional student care management program has successfully provided a clinical experience for student teams who practice health care coaching, mental health screening and counseling, patient education, medication monitoring, and linking patients to community resources for uncontrolled adult diabetic patients in an LSU outpatient clinic. A  recipient of the AAMC Clinical Innovation Challenge Award, the program offers students from nursing, medicine, pharmacy (Xavier), and social work clinical experience functioning as a team one-half day a week for the school year. 

 

Course Overview:

The Diabetes Interprofessional Medicine Program (DIME) is a program that integrates clinical service with education guided by the Exemplary Care and Learning site Model (Headrick LA, 2011), introducing principles of a patient centered medical home (PCMH) into an ambulatory site using a team of learners from nursing, medicine, pharmacy, and social work. The team provides care management for a high-risk population of uncontrolled diabetic patients. Learners experience elements of the PCMH through participation, learn teamwork skills, and contribute positively to improving patient care outcomes.

 

Program Goals:

• Engage interprofessional learners in management of a population of high-risk patients (diabetics)
• Learn interprofessional teamwork focused on meeting target indicators for this population
• Introduce activities in practice and learning that promote patient self-management of their chronic condition and improvement in practice

 

Learning Objectives:

At the conclusion of the elective, students will be better able to:

• Apply the goals of diabetes management including annual eye and foot exams, control of blood pressure, hemoglobin A1c, and lipids
• Describe behavior change strategies
• Practice communication with patients, families, and other health professionals in a responsive and responsible manner that supports a team approach to the maintenance of health and the treatment of disease
• Develop relationship-building values and the principles of team dynamics to perform effectively in different team roles to plan and deliver patient/population-centered care that is safe, timely, efficient, effective, and equitable

 

Course Director:

Pamela Wiseman, MD
Susan M. Leary and Richard A. Culbertson Professorship
Vice Chair of Undergraduate Education, Family Medicine
Associate Professor of Clinical Family Medicine
pwise1@lsuhsc.edu

 

Course Coordinator:

Atricia Every

Primary Care Program Coordinator

LSUHSC

Dept. of Family Medicine

2021 Perdido Street, 4th Floor Suite 4303

New Orleans, La 70112

504-568-3550 (O)

504-568-6793 (F)