The Patient-Centered Outcomes Research Institute (PCOR) Board of Governors has approved 71 awards totaling more than $114 million over three years to fund comparative Clinical Effectiveness Research (CER). This is the first time that studies specifically targeting improvement of research methods have been awarded PCORI funding.
These latest awards include studies of ways to improve care for and the health of people with heart disease, chronic pain, several types of cancer, obesity, diabetes, kidney disease, autism, respiratory disorders, and various mental health conditions. Several projects will explore ways to support patient and family caregiver decision-making, reduce health disparities, and improve healthcare delivery systems.
The first group of studies selected to improve research methods include efforts to improve the applicability of data collected through new sources, such as EHRs and social media sites for clinical research, methods to engage minority patients and caregivers as active partners in patient-centered health research, and ways to improve the existing methods for studies with few outcome events such as treatments for rare diseases and newly marketed therapies.
One of the PCORI awards for $1.9 million for a three year project went to the George Washington School of Medicine and Health Sciences in Washington D.C. to contribute to their five year mHealth Initiative that has produced the groundwork in mobile health. The researchers will examine the combined use of mobile phones and community health workers working together to improve patient management of chronic diseases.
According to studies, diabetes is a complex chronic disease with less than 63 percent of patients achieving desired glycemic, lipid, and blood pressure goals. Richard Katz M.D., Professor of Cardiology, Professor of Medicine and the Director of the Division of Cardiology at GW University, reports that his research team is going to conduct a study that will combine traditional and modern healthcare strategies to help improve diabetes care.
The study will follow 200 diabetes patients with Medicaid insurance in the Washington D.C area for one year. One group of patients will use the diabetes cell phone system. With the cell phone system, patients will have an open line of communication with their community health worker and medical team and both the medical team and patient will be able to monitor blood sugar and blood pressure levels.
A second groups will be assigned a community health worker only, and the third group will have a cell phone system and also be assigned a community health worker. The community health worker will work with the patients on caring for their diabetes and help keep patients in contact with their doctors.
For more information, go to http://pcori.org.