Holistic T2D care pilot programme takes flight

AstraZeneca has announced the launch of Take CaRe of Me, an end-to-end type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM) management programme to prevent associated cardio-renal complications through advanced diagnostics and a holistic approach to disease management.

With multiple partners engaged, including diagnostics tech provider Tricog Health, and tertiary care centres Sunway Medical Centre, Sunway Medical Centre Velocity, and Cardiac Vascular Sentral Kuala Lumpur, the programme aims to introduce integrated data and diagnostic support solutions into the T2DM patient journey, starting from the point of primary care.

The collaboration was recently formalized at a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) signing ceremony among the five parties.

Diabetic patients visiting partner clinics can access early HbA1c, lipid profile and albumin-creatinine ratio (ACR) screening tests. With support from the Abbott Afinion^TM point-of-care testing system, primary care physicians (PCPs) and dedicated programme nurses can profile and identify patients at high risk of future cardio-renal complications.

Once such patients have been identified, they will receive referrals to one of the three partnered tertiary care centres, where they can obtain specialist assessment and further echocardiogram testing. Artificial intelligence technology provides further support for the consulting specialist to evaluate test results and develop a treatment plan for the patients.

Individual health data from the programme is also incorporated into the Take CaRe of Me Registry, a data-generation initiative which assists the clinical assessment of cardio-renal complication risk in patients with T2DM. The registry in turn supports identification, prevention, and treatment of comorbidities by PCPs at an early stage of disease management.

To begin with, the pilot programme is available at three primary care clinics—Poliklinik Shaik in Kota Kemuning, and Klinik Seri Indah and Klinik Wong Singh in Selayang Jaya. According to AstraZeneca representatives, the programme will be expanded to 15 clinics in the next 3 years, with a target of diagnosing more than 6,000 patients.

“By embedding early disease management of long-term risks in the primary care setting, we can delay complications and ensure early diagnosis and referral, ultimately improving the standard of care for people living with T2DM,” said Dr Sanjeev Panchal, country president of AstraZeneca Malaysia.

Commenting on the programme’s launch, Sanjeev added that the establishment of a holistic management approach and integrating advanced diagnostics into an early stage of the treatment pathway would hopefully further develop the local primary care ecosystem, minimise the cardio-renal risks related to T2DM and save more lives.

The 2019 National Health and Morbidity Survey (NHMS) estimated that 9.4 percent (95% confidence interval [CI], 8.66–10.20) of the Malaysian population had known T2DM, while another 8.9 percent (95% CI, 7.96–9.93) had undiagnosed raised blood glucose levels.

A recent large-scale multinational study also reported that 18 percent of patients with T2DM initially free from cardiovascular or renal disease developed their first manifestation thereof within the first 4.5 years from diagnosis. [Diabetes Obes Metab 2020;22(9):1607–1618]