Diabetes Resource Library

The Diabetes Champions Toolkit is a portfolio of resources intended for community health center staff committed to improving outcomes for patients with diabetes. These resources specifically focus on interventions that a health center can readily implement into practice. Based on the National Association of Community Health Center’s (NACHC) framework, the toolkit structures interventions into four categories: Patient Activation and Behavior Change, Reducing Health Inequities, Optimizing Teams, and Health Systems and Infrastructure.

Diabetes Driver Diagram – This tool, often used in learning collaboratives, assists health centers in identifying research-based drivers of positive change in patient outcomes. The tool suggests changes that health centers can test in PDSAs in order to support patients and providers in diabetes management.

• Guidelines for Care – The National Institutes of Health has collaborated with more than a dozen professional organizations and federal agencies to publish “Guiding Principles for the Care of People With or at Risk for Diabetes”, which aims to identify and synthesize areas of general agreement among existing guidelines to help guide primary care providers and health care teams to deliver quality care to adults with or at risk for diabetes.
• Dental Guidelines – The American Dental Association has information on diabetes and dental health, which shows how patients with diabetes are at greater risk of developing some oral health problems.
• Diabetic Retinopathy Guidelines – The American Diabetes Association updated their position statement outlining guidelines on prevention, assessment, and treatment of diabetic retinopathy. The position statement outlines the stages of diabetic retinopathy and highlights recommendations on optimal blood glycemic control and lowering blood pressure.

• U.S. Diabetes Statistics – The CDC publishes an updated report on statistics about diabetes in the United States, including information on prevalence and incidence, prediabetes, risk factors for complication, and costs. The 2021 report is now available.
• State & County Statistics – The CDC publishes national, state, and county data and trends on diabetes, as well as a diabetes state burden toolkit.

• Health Equity Resources – The National CLAS Standards, sponsored by the Office of Minority Health, are intended to advance health equity, improve quality, and help eliminate disparities. They offer a guide to assist providers, administrators, and executives communicate in a way that considers the health literacy and cultural needs of patients. This is important for organizations considering racial/ethnic disparities, as the rates of diabetes in Blacks and American Indians are higher (11.4% and 14.9% respectively) as compared to Whites (8.4%).
• Health Disparities Interventions – This article from Medical Care Research and Review evaluates the effectiveness of health care interventions at improving health outcomes and/or reducing diabetes health disparities among racial/ethnic minorities with diabetes.
• Differences in Care Among the Medicare Population – The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services published diabetes-focused data that examined racial and ethnic differences in self-reported measures on access to care, propensity to seek care, self-care knowledge and behaviors, diabetes management, and complications among Medicare beneficiaries ages 65 and older.

• Patient Education Materials – The Massachusetts Clearinghouse is a resource to find diabetes health promotion materials for patients and providers.

• Community Preventive Services, Programs, and Other Interventions – The Community Preventive Services Task Force is an independent, non-federal panel of public health and prevention experts that provides evidence-based findings and recommendations about community preventive services, programs, and other interventions aimed at improving population health. They have created a list of recommendations based on literature reviews that guides practices on how to implement team-based care for diabetes improvement efforts.
• Cultural Competence – This article in Current Diabetes Reports discusses several successful, culturally competent community-based diabetes programs and the key elements needed to implement the programs at a community or health system level.
• The Role of CHWs – This article in Current Diabetes Reports highlights the role of community health workers in improving diabetes outcomes.
• Food Insecurity – The Greater Boston Food Bank offers a food assistance locator to provide a list of food assistance options in eastern Massachusetts and the hours and days that they’re open.

• National Diabetes Prevention Program (NDPP) – The National DPP is a CDC-recognized diabetes prevention lifestyle change program to help prevent or delay type 2 diabetes.