The statistics in this strategy make for confronting reading – validating what podiatrists encounter on a regular basis.
Each year in Australia:
510,000 people have foot problems because of diabetes
47,100 people go to hospital because of these foot problems
6,300 people will lose part of their foot or leg because of these foot problems
$2.7 billion is spent to treat these foot problems
If we take better care of people’s feet, half of these hospital visits, amputations, and costs could be avoided.
These statistics helped to inform the strategy’s focus, being three-fold:
Better access to care for everyone.
Make sure care is good quality.
More research and development.
If the strategy across these three areas is fully implemented, DFA estimates it could prevent 20,250 hospitalisations, 2,840 amputations, and save $940 million in healthcare costs each year.
This is where podiatrists come into the picture. Below are the essential points in the strategy for podiatrists to take note – the three key areas of focus, and the goals within each area.
The full strategy can be downloaded at the links towards the end of this article.
FOCUS #1:
Better access to care for everyone
WHAT THIS LOOKS LIKE
Annual foot checkups: Make sure all people with diabetes get their feet checked yearly by a health professional to see how likely they are to get foot problems and catch them early.
Care to prevent foot problems: When people are found to be more likely to get foot problems, they should get regular foot care, wear the right shoes, and learn how to keep their feet healthy.
Special care teams for foot sores: When someone has a sore on their foot, they should get care from a special team of foot care experts to prevent it from getting worse.
WHAT IS NEEDED
GOAL 1: All people living with diabetes need access to culturally responsive evidence-based annual screening to determine their risk of diabetes-related foot ulcers and inform their risk-based footcare.
GOAL 2: All people at risk of diabetes-related foot ulcers need access to recommended culturally responsive evidence-based preventative footcare from trained health professionals.
GOAL 3: All people with active diabetes-related foot disease need access to clinically safe and culturally responsive evidence-based healthcare from interdisciplinary High Risk Foot Services.
WHAT PODIATRISTS CAN DO
Communicate the risk of DFD with your patients and in your communities, encourage activity in the below areas, support people living with diabetes to be proactive in caring for their foot health and having regular foot health check-ups.
Good foot care service standards: Make sure the rules for foot care services are based on the latest research and services follow these rules to do a good job for patients.
Collect foot care information: Collect information about foot care services to make sure they keep improving and give better results for patients.
Good foot care guidelines: Regularly update the guidelines that tell health professionals how to best treat foot problems, based on the latest research.
WHAT IS NEEDED
GOAL 4: All people living with diabetes-related foot disease should have access to interdisciplinary High Risk Foot Services that meet evidence-based standards.
GOAL 5: All health service regions should report their diabetes-related foot disease outcomes annually and contribute standardised data to a registry that enables benchmarking and collaboration.
GOAL 6: Australian national diabetes-related foot disease guidelines should continually reflect the most up-to-date evidence to guide best practice standards for healthcare provision across Australia.
WHAT PODIATRISTS CAN DO
Keep up to date with the latest evidence-based research, standards and guidelines your practice should follow.
Collect data in your clinic to track patient outcomes and gain a better understanding of patient requirements and patterns.
FOCUS #3
More research and development
WHAT THIS LOOKS LIKE
More money for research: Lobby for more money for research (an extra $30 million per year) to learn more about how to help people with foot problems get better faster.
Plan for research: Make sure the money spent on more research is spent in the best ways to help different communities with foot problems.
Create a research network: Set up a national group of scientists and researchers to work together, learn from each other, and teach new researchers to help foot care get better faster.
WHAT IS NEEDED
GOAL 7: Research investment for diabetes-related foot disease should be proportional to its impact on Australians
GOAL 8: An Australian foot health and disease in diabetes research framework responsive to local and national priorities should be developed
GOAL 9: An Australian foot health and disease in diabetes research network should be established
WHAT PODIATRISTS CAN DO
Align with the Australian Podiatry Association’s advocacy team to provide hands-on support for entities such as APERF,ACPD, and JFAR.
More information
If you want to learn more about this and related issues:
