ODH Collaborative

The ODH Collaborative Team is a collection of healthcare and epidemiology experts from the Ohio Department of Health working together to improve the health of women with GDM. The mission of the group is to prevent, delay or diagnose earlier, type 2 diabetes among women with a history of gestational diabetes mellitus.

The ODH Collaborative was formed with the goals of:

1. Ensuring all women of child-bearing age in Ohio are educated about the risks of GDM and T2DM and have access to preventive and treatment services for GDM to reduce their risk of developing T2DM.
2. Ensuring health care practitioners in Ohio provide preconception, postpartum, and ongoing care for women to prevent gestational and T2DM. The plan is to increase awareness and knowledge through presentations, written materials, and continuing education.
3. Enhancing the understanding of the epidemiology of gestational diabetes and T2DM among Ohio women of reproductive age using the data to inform messaging.

About

The Ohio Gestational Diabetes Mellitus (GDM) Collaborative aims to increase the number of women who receive postpartum testing and education for Type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM) so health risks are addressed early and effectively. The Office of Health Improvement and Wellness and the Bureau of Health Promotion form the Ohio Department of Health's (ODH) Ohio (GDM) Collaborative. Ohio Medicaid is an additional partner. The group is a unique collaboration between chronic disease and maternal child health with the over-arching goal to prevent or delay the onset of Type 2 diabetes mellitus in (T2DM) women who have a history of gestational diabetes (GDM). The team formed in the spring of 2010 when ODH competitively applied and was selected to participate in a national, year-long learning collaborative administered by Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), Association of Maternal and Child Health Programs (AMCHP), and the National Association of Chronic Disease Directors (NACDD). The team has worked to improve preventive healthcare provision in Ohio in accordance with national guidelines; increase the public’s knowledge about gestational diabetes; reduce the Type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM) risk; and increasing access to preventive care. In addition, it has worked to improve the understanding of the epidemiology of gestational diabetes in Ohio by increasing the availability, use and dissemination of public health data.

During our brief, but impactful history the team had several key accomplishments that proved to be the foundation of the quality improvement initiative that began in 2013. Those accomplishments were:

• Gestational Diabetes in Ohio Data book 2006-2008, published in 2011; a second edition was completed in 2016.
• Healthcare Provider Survey. In 2012 we sampled 2,000 OBGYN’s nurse midwives, Family Practitioners, and Internal Medicine doctors on their knowledge and attitudes toward GDM. We also did a second provider survey in 2015.
• Focus Groups. In 2012 we also completed an extensive series of focus groups to find out the general knowledge and attitudes about GDM among women in Ohio.

These activities led to planning the quality improvement initiative with the Government Resource Center (GRC) with a focus on increasing attendance of the postpartum visit and postpartum testing rates for T2DM.