The United States has 86 million adults with prediabetes. Individuals with prediabetes can prevent or delay the development of type 2 diabetes through lifestyle modifications such as participation in the National Diabetes Prevention Program (DPP), thereby mitigating the medical and economic burdens associated with diabetes. A cohort analysis of a commercially insured population was conducted using individual-level claims data from Truven Health MarketScan® Lab Database to identify adults with prediabetes, track whether they develop diabetes, and compare medical expenditures for those who are newly diagnosed with diabetes to those who are not. This study then illustrates how reducing the risk of developing diabetes by participation in an evidence-based lifestyle change program could yield both positive net savings on medical care expenditures and return on investment (ROI). Annual expenditures are found to be nearly one third higher for those who develop diabetes in subsequent years relative to those who do not transition from prediabetes to diabetes, with an average difference of $2671 per year. At that cost differential, the 3-year ROI for a National DPP is estimated to be as high as 42%. The results show the importance and economic benefits of participation in lifestyle intervention programs to prevent or delay the onset of type 2 diabetes.
BackgroundEffective hypertension management often necessitates patients’ adherence to the blood pressure (BP)-lowering medication regimen they are prescribed. Patients’ adherence to that regimen can be affected by prescription- and payment-related factors that are typically controlled by prescribers, filling pharmacies, pharmacy benefit managers, and/or patients’ health insurance plans. This study describes patterns and changes from 2009 to 2014 in factors that the literature reports are associated with increased adherence to BP-lowering medication.Methods and FindingsWe use a robust source of United States prescription sales data—IMS Health’s National Prescription Audit—to describe BP-lowering medication fill counts and spending in 2009 compared with 2014. Moreover, we describe patterns and changes in adherence-promoting factors across age groups, payment sources, and medication classes. From 2009 to 2014, the BP-lowering medication prescription fill count increased from 613.7 million to 653.0 million. Encouraging changes in adherence-promoting factors included: the share of generic fills increased from 82.5% to 95.0%; average days’ supply per fill increased from 45.9 to 51.8 days; and average total (patient contribution) spending per years’ supply decreased from $359 ($54) to $311 ($37). Possibly undesirable changes included: the percentage of fills for fixed-dose combinations decreased from 17.1% to 14.2% and acquired via mail order decreased from 10.7% to 8.2%. In 2014: 653.0 million fills occurred accounting for $28.81B in spending; adults aged 45–64 years had the highest percentage of fixed-dose combinations fills (16.9%); and fills with Medicaid as the payment source had the lowest average patient spending per fill ($1.19).ConclusionsWe identified both encouraging and possibly undesirable patterns and changes from 2009 to 2014 in factors that promote adherence to BP-lowering medications during this period. Continued tracking of these metrics using pharmacy sales data can help identify areas that can be addressed by clinical and policy interventions to improve adherence for medications commonly used to treat hypertension.
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What is already known on this topic? Approximately three-fourths of US adults with hypertension do not have their blood pressure controlled. Medication adherence is important in hypertension management and can be affected by how medications are prescribed and purchased. What is added by this report? We found considerable variation in prescription-and payment-related factors that promote medication adherence by geography and across the largest patient market segments comprised of medication prescriber, insurance payer type, and age. What are the implications for public health practice? Blood pressure control rates are low and may be affected by uptake of the adherence promotion factors assessed. Increased uptake of these promoters, especially in the regions and populations in most need, could improve hypertension management.
Accurate blood pressure measurement is crucial for proper screening, diagnosis, and monitoring of high blood pressure. However, providers are not aware of proper blood pressure measurement skills, do not master all the appropriate skills, or miss key steps in the process, leading to inconsistent or inaccurate readings. Training in blood pressure measurement for most providers is usually limited to a one-time brief demonstration during professional education coursework. The American Medical Association and the American Heart Association developed a 30-minute e-Learning module designed to refresh and improve existing blood pressure measurement knowledge and clinical skills among practicing providers. One hundred seventy-seven practicing providers, which included medical assistants, nurses, advanced practice providers, and physicians, participated in a multi-site randomized educational study designed to assess the effect of this e-Learning module on blood pressure measurement knowledge and skills. Participants were randomized 1:1 to either the intervention or control group. The intervention group followed a pre-post assessment approach, and the control group followed a test-retest approach. The initial assessment showed that participants in both the intervention and control groups correctly performed less than half of the 14 skills considered necessary to obtain an accurate blood pressure measurement (mean scores 5.5 and 5.9, respectively). Following the e-Learning module, the intervention group performed on average of 3.4 more skills correctly vs 1.4 in the control group (P < .01). Our findings reinforce existing evidence that errors in provider blood pressure measurements are highly prevalent and provide novel evidence that refresher training improves measurement accuracy.
In response to high prevalence of hypertension and suboptimal rates of blood pressure (BP) control in the US, the Surgeon General released a Call-to-Action to Control Hypertension (Call-to-Action) in the fall of 2020 to address the negative consequences of uncontrolled BP. In addition to morbidity and mortality associated with hypertension, hypertension has an annual cost to the US healthcare system of $71 billion. The Call-to-Action makes recommendations for improving BP control, and the purpose of this review was to summarize the literature on the cost-effectiveness of these strategies. We identified a number of studies that demonstrate the cost saving or cost-effectiveness of recommendations in the Call-to-Action including strategies to promote access to and availability of physical activity opportunities and healthy food options within communities, advance the use of standardized treatment approaches and guideline-recommended care, to promote the use of health care teams to manage hypertension, and to empower and equip patients to use self-measured blood pressure monitoring and medication adherence strategies. While the current review identified numerous cost-effective methods to achieve the Surgeon General’s recommendations for improving BP control, future work should determine the cost-effectiveness of the 2017 American College of Cardiology and American Heart Association Hypertension guidelines, interventions to lower therapeutic inertia, and optimal team-based care strategies, among other areas of research. Economic evaluation studies should also be prioritized to generate more comprehensive data on how to provide efficient and high value care to improve BP control.
Background Controlled blood pressure can prevent or reduce adverse health outcomes. Social and structural determinants may contribute to the disparity that despite equivalent proportions on anti-hypertensive medication, non-Hispanic Black (Black) adults have lower blood pressure control and more cardiovascular events than non-Hispanic White (White) adults. Methods Data from 2013-2018 National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey were pooled to assess control among Black and White adults by anti-hypertensive medication use and selected characteristics using the 2017 American College of Cardiology/American Heart Association (ACC/AHA) Blood Pressure Guideline definition (systolic blood pressure <130 mm Hg and diastolic blood pressure <80 mm Hg) among 4,739 adults. Results Among those treated with anti-hypertensive medication, an estimated 34.9% of Black and 45.0% of White adults had controlled blood pressure. Control was lower for Black and White adults among most subgroups of age, sex, education, insurance status, usual source of care, and poverty-income ratio. Black adults had higher use of diuretics (28.5%--Black adults vs. 23.5%--White adults) and calcium channel blockers (24.2%--Black adults vs. 14.7%--White adults) compared to White adults. Control among Black adults was lower than White adults across all medication classes including diuretics (36.1%--Black adults vs. 47.3%--White adults), calcium channel blockers (30.2%--Black adults vs. 40.1%--White adults), and number of medication classes used. Conclusions Sub-optimal blood pressure control rates and disparities warrant increased efforts to improve control, which could include addressing social and structural determinants along with emphasizing implementation of the 2017 ACC/AHA Blood Pressure Guideline into clinical practice.
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