carlie Posted January 17, 2013 Share Posted January 17, 2013 Veterans Affairs Office of Inspector General (OIG) sent this bulletin at 01/17/2013 03:05 PM ESTHealthcare Inspection Foot Care for Patients with Diabetes and Additional Risk Factors for Amputation01/16/2013 07:00 PM ESTThe VA Office of Inspector General Office of Healthcare Inspections assessedwhether patients with diabetes mellitus and additional risk factors for lowerextremity amputation received annual foot care in accordance with VeteransHealth Administration (VHA) requirements.The study population consisted ofpatients with a diagnosis of diabetes mellitus and one or more of the followingrisk factors for amputation during July 1, 2009February 28, 2010: peripheralvascular disease, peripheral neuropathy, and Charcot joint disease with footdeformity.We used a two-stage approach to evaluate the annual rate of patientencounters with VA or fee-basis foot care specialists.We first examined administrative data for evidence of specialized foot care andthen conducted a focused electronic health records review of a randomly selected sample of patients for whom there was no evidence of annual care inadministrative data.We estimated the VHA compliance rate for annual foot carein this population at increased risk to be 66.2 percent, and we are 95 percentconfident that the actual compliance rate is between 64.95 and 67.49 percent.We recommended and the Under Secretary for Health agreed to implement a planto ensure compliance with VHAs requirement that patients who are at increasedrisk for amputation be examined by a foot care specialist at leastonce each year.LINK:http://content.govdelivery.com/bulletins/gd/USVAOIG-678479 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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