The American Diabetes Association updated its Standards of Medical Care supplement in December, to provide clinicians, researchers, policy makers, and other interested individuals with the components of diabetes care, general treatment goals, and tools to evaluate the quality of care.
Diabetes is a complex, chronic illness requiring continuous medical care with multifactorial risk-reduction strategies beyond glycaemic control. Ongoing self-management education and support are critical to preventing acute complications and reducing the risk of long-term complications. Significant evidence exists that supports a range of interventions to improve diabetes outcomes.
The Standards of Care recommendations should be applied in the context of excellent clinical care, with adjustments for individual preferences, comorbidities, and other patient factors.
The recommendations include screening, diagnostic, and therapeutic actions that are known or believed to favourably affect health outcomes of patients with diabetes. They encompass care for youth (from birth to 11 years and adolescents aged 12–18 years) and older adults (65 and older).
The ADA has been actively involved in the development and dissemination of diabetes care clinical practice recommendations and related documents for more than 30 years and its Standards of Medical Care is viewed as an important resource for those caring for people with diabetes.
The annual Standards of Care supplement to Diabetes Care contains official ADA position, is authored by the ADA, and provides all of the ADAʼs current clinical practice recommendations.
The Standards of Medical Care in Diabetes was originally approved in 1988.
ADA medical care
American Diabetes Association Standards of Medical Care (Open access)
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