Shaping the future of diabetes care. Disease management programs for diabetes and their need for improvement

Background Due to the epidemiological significance of diabetes as awidespread disease, it is essential to deal with future fields of action in diabetes care. This article aims to emphasize future fields of action and derive measures for diabetes care and prevention from the perspective of health insurance funds.ResultsThe delivery of novel, evidence-based and patient-centered diabetes care as well as the improvement of population-based prevention and health promotion measures are seen as main aspects of future diabetes care. Particular attention needs to be paid to the needs-driven improvement of disease management programs (DMP) to pursue their positive impetus for diabetes care. In this regard the future aim should be to transform DMP to amore flexible as well as prevention and target-group oriented program. Thus, the timely integration of innovative health care elements and the idea of prevention as an integral part of DMP could be further improvements. In addition, greater consideration should be given to the numerous potentials of digitization for future diabetes care, including the utilization of e-health services to make healthcare processes morepatient-centered. Furthermore, asignificant reduction of the diabetes incidence is only achievable by collective efforts from society as awhole by creating living conditions that promote health and reducing the socioeconomic impact on the risk to develop diabetes.ConclusionImprovements in diabetes care can be achieved by further tailoring successful programs such as DMP to diabetes patients needs and smartly integrating innovative e-health services into health care. The national diabetes strategy is astarting point toward adefinite shift in society as awhole regarding the expansion of prevention and health promotion measures.