The Journal of continuing education in the health professions
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J Contin Educ Health Prof · Jan 2014
Improving quality of care for diabetes through a maintenance of certification activity: family physicians' use of the chronic care model.
Improving the care of patients with diabetes is a health care priority. Through Part 4 of Maintenance of Certification for Family Physicians (MC-FP), American Board of Family Medicine (ABFM) diplomates participate in quality improvement (QI) modules for diabetes. Our objective was to determine associations between physician characteristics and actions taken during Part 4 diabetes modules with quality of care outcomes. ⋯ Through MC-FP, family physicians improved the quality of care they delivered to diabetic patients. Improvement of care across nearly all measures, despite no consistent associations between processes of care or physician characteristics with improvement, suggests that participation in QI itself may lead to higher quality health care and this may be achieved through MC-FP.