Understanding and Improving Diabetes Care for Ethnic Minorities

Reducing Racial Disparities in Diabetes Care - The Coached Care Study

In this study, we are testing the effectiveness of an intervention known as "Coached Care" to improve health outcomes and quality of care of patients being treated for type 2 diabetes, particularly patients in underserved populations. The intervention involves training members of minority communities who have diabetes to be "coaches", teaching minority patients the skills needed to participate effectively in care during office visits, as they present for those visits. Coaches follow patients for 9 routine consecutive visits, reinforcing participation skills before and between their routine office visits.

Inclusion Criteria:

• diagnosis of type 2 diabetes
• At least one Hemoglobin A1c value greater than 7.5% in the year prior to recruitment.

Exclusion Criteria:

• Age above 80 years
• patients with dementia or other serious mental health problems that would prevent them from participating in the intervention.
• patients with other serious medical problems that would prevent them from participating in the intervention.