Building Diabetes Care Capacity in Rural Underserved Communities—A Comparison of Cardiorenal Risk Factor Outcomes in Patients Treated by ECHO-Trained Providers vs. an Academic Medical Center
Sunday, June 25, at 11:30 a.m. PT
Poster Halls B-C
San Diego Convention Center
Matthew Bouchonville, MD, CDCES
Endocrinologist, Associate Professor,
University of New Mexico School of Medicine
What is your presentation about?
Diabetes care has become exquisitely specialized as newer therapies and technologies have emerged. While this allows for individualizing diabetes care to improve outcomes, many primary care providers do not feel adequately trained and refer their patients out to an increasingly scarce workforce of diabetes specialists. We developed a long-standing virtual community of practice (Endo ECHO), consisting of specialists and frontline health care workers from medically underserved areas of New Mexico. Our presentation will report clinical outcomes of patients with diabetes cared for by ECHO-mentored primary care providers versus those cared for by specialists at the academic medical center.
What makes this topic important in 2023?
As diabetes care is advancing, important health disparities are emerging for patients with diabetes living in rural communities who are not reaping the same benefits experienced by their urban peers.
How did you become involved with this area of diabetes research or care?
I trained in the beautiful, but medically underserved, state of New Mexico where the ECHO model was first developed to improve the health of our community. Given the disproportionate rates of diabetes affecting New Mexicans, I have seen firsthand how ECHO can improve capacity in underserved communities for optimal diabetes care.
How do you think your presentation will impact diabetes research or care?
The challenges I describe are sadly not unique to New Mexico. We have collaborated with diabetes specialists at academic medical centers across the nation to start new diabetes ECHO programs and there is great interest in learning how this intervention impacts clinical outcomes for the country’s most vulnerable populations with diabetes.
What are you most looking forward to at the 83rd Scientific Sessions?
I am most excited about reconnecting with and meeting new colleagues with a shared vision of reducing disparities affecting people with diabetes, particularly those living in rural communities.