Health Care Interventions to Improve the Quality of Diabetes Care in African Americans

Diabetes Care: March 1, 2013

Type 2 diabetes is a serious, costly, and potentially preventable public health problem in the U.S., and both the prevalence and incidence of diabetes have increased rapidly since the mid-1990s (1). Currently, >7% of adults in the U.S. have been diagnosed with type 2 diabetes, and diabetes-related care accounts for 11% of all U.S. health care expenditures.

African Americans bear a disproportionate burden from diabetes and its complications. Compared with Caucasians, African Americans are almost twice as likely to suffer from type 2 diabetes and to experience diabetes-related blindness and lower-limb amputations, and two to six times more likely to have kidney disease (3). Furthermore, these disparities are enhanced when in tandem with other axes of inequality, such as geographic region, age, or sex. Read more