Redesigning the Traditional Community Health Screening Model to Provide Blood Glucose Screening and Interdisciplinary Health Education

C ommunity health screenings provide an opportunity for anyone to receive free or inexpensive health evaluations to help determine their risk of developing a medical condition such as diabetes. A major disadvantage to traditional health screenings is that they provide one-time data for participants but lack continuity of care. The participants are required to independently use the results from their screening to follow up with another provider. Early detection and screenings can improve patient health outcomes and reduce the costs of care. The Diabetes Prevention Program conducted by the National Institutes of Health and the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services showed that people at risk for developing diabetes could prevent or delay the onset of the disease through early detection, lifestyle modification, and medication therapy, when appropriate (1). An economic analysis by Chatterjee et al. (2) found that early detection of diabetes through health screenings provides overall health care cost savings. With these considerations in mind, the goal of this project was to redesign the community health screening model to provide regularly scheduled health screening opportunities, patient education, and early detection and to improve access to care. Recognizing the need to expand clinical screening services provided in a community setting, the College of Pharmacy at Washington State University (WSU) decided to redesign the traditional health screenings model to improve patient outcomes by providing multiple scheduled follow-up visits and to improve access by offering onsite health screenings at participants' workplaces. A partnership developed between the College of Pharmacy and the staff of local schools to increase early recognition and provide screening for costly disease states. The Institute for Healthcare Improvement Triple Aim Initiative (3) was considered in selecting specific screenings that could reduce overall costs of care through early detection, improve the health of the population, and improve patients' experience by bringing screenings to convenient (worksite) locations. In addition to screenings, these events provided disease state education and recommendations for follow-up based on individuals' screening results. Screenings offered included blood glucose, blood pressure, bone fracture risk, dental/oral health, BMI, body fat percentage, and grip strength. Initially, the onsite community health screenings were organized and operated by pharmacy students. To increase interprofessional, team-based student learning and patient accessibility to multiple health care disciplines in the same site, the WSU College of Pharmacy invited students and faculty from the WSU Nursing and Nutrition Exercise Physiology programs, ©2015 by the American Diabetes …