Patient information
General information for patients
Diabetes is a leading cause of death and disability in Australia.
One way to monitor the outcomes associated with diabetes care is to use a Clinical Quality Audit to measure the quality of the health care provided and identify relevant areas of practice that can be improved.
What is a clinical quality audit?
Clinical Quality Audits are large, centralised databanks of health information collected to assess and report on the quality of health care with the aim of facilitating service improvement. The information collected by clinical audits assess whether care is safe and effective and delivered in an appropriate manner. In order to improve the quality of diabetes care, we need to measure the factors that contribute to the most successful outcomes.
An audit such as ANDA collects:
- Patient health information (data) as part of routine clinical care
- Consecutive cases over a minimum one month data collection period (all relevant patients attending the diabetes centre are included)
What is ANDA?
The Australian National Diabetes Audit (ANDA) has been established to collect information about diabetes care and outcomes. The audit aims to improve the safety and quality of diabetes health care for patients across Australia.
What information is collected?
ANDA collects information from your diabetes centre about your health and details about the treatments and the care you receive. Information collected in different years may include:
- Diabetes type
- Diabetes management
- Blood glucose control
- Blood pressure
- Height, weight
- Smoking status
- Lipids
- Kidney function
- Complications
- Comorbidities
- Health professional attendances
- Patient self-care practices
- Quality of life assessment
ANDA does not collect information that can identify you. Your diabetes centre is given a coded site number which is only held by the ANDA Secretariat. Your individual information is coded by the diabetes centre itself.
If you decide that you do not wish to have your information included in ANDA please let the clinic staff at your diabetes centre know so that your information is not collected or can be removed. This will not affect any treatment you receive.
Allowing your diabetes centre to include your information in the audit will help your diabetes centre to improve the quality of care they provide.
What is ANDA-L?
Some of you may be invited to participate in a longer term audit follow up (ANDA-L). This is an additional activity of ANDA where the same information will be collected every 2 years to see if there are any changes in your health and its management over time. This information will potentially be linked to external government databases which will assist with following ANDA-L’s activities into the future.
If you consent to participate with the longer term follow up of ANDA-L the following information will be collected in addition to the information listed above:
- Name
- Date of birth
- Contact information (Phone number and postcode)
Staff at your participating diabetes centre may contact you directly to see how you have been since your information was collected at your last routine clinic visit. This should only take 5-10 minutes of your time.
Staff will remind you that the information you provide will be used in the longer term audit follow up and you can choose to withdraw should you not wish for further information to be included.
Where is data stored?
Your information will be coded to secure your identity. The patient code linking your name to your information will be stored electronically in a password protected database within the Monash University’s secure network based in Victoria, Australia. Paper copies will be secured in a locked room at your diabetes centre and the ANDA site based in Victoria, Australia. No-one except your diabetes centre and the ANDA team will be able to gain access to your information. Access will only be used for identifying you for follow-up purposes. We have reliable security measures in place to protect your information.
What sort of information will be published from ANDA?
We will produce and distribute group data site specific reports on diabetes health outcomes that will be provided to each diabetes centre. National reports on diabetes health outcomes for clinical, government and academic audiences will also be produced and made available. All patient health information provided for reporting is coded (your identity remains confidential).
We anticipate that these reports will help to inform us about common trends and/or gaps that may exist in service provision.
Researchers may use coded group data for future research projects however, any research using ANDA data will require approval by a Human Research Ethics Committee.
No ANDA report or publication will ever contain any identifying information about you the participating patient.
What sort of approval do you have to collect my information?
ANDA has been reviewed and approved by the Monash Health Human Research Ethics Committee and the Royal Australian College of General Practitioners National Research and Evaluation Ethics Committee (RACGP NREEC).