# Expanding Patient Engagement in Diabetes Care: Patient Portal Innovation

> **NIH NIH R18** · VANDERBILT UNIVERSITY MEDICAL CENTER · 2021 · $651,608

## Abstract

Project Summary/Abstract
Evidence-based diabetes monitoring & preventative services can prevent or delay many costly and highly
morbid disease-related complications, yet many patients do not receive all clinically-meaningful, evidence-
based services. For example, while detecting and treating early diabetic eye disease can reduce the
development of severe vision loss by an estimated 60%, approximately 40% of Americans with diabetes do not
receive an annual eye exam. Prior research has demonstrated numerous barriers to the completion of
evidence-based diabetes monitoring & preventative services including patient factors (eg, lack of awareness
and limited health literacy) and clinician/system factors (eg, limited physician time and patient support between
visits). Attempts to increase diabetes monitoring & preventative services have had only modest results. To
achieve optimal rates of these services, an intervention is urgently needed that improves clinical efficiency by
decreasing clinician workload, is appropriate for patients with varying levels of health literacy, and is highly
scalable and sustainable. By providing an engaging and convenient means to track and visualize health data,
obtain education and guidance, receive notifications, and connect patients and doctors, patient portals offer a
promising platform to enhance access to health services while overcoming the limitations of costly and difficult
to scale face-to-face interventions. Our research team previously applied user-centered Design Sprint
methodology to develop patient portal features and functionality that were engaging and satisfying for a diverse
group of patients with diabetes to use and provided users with a better understanding of their diabetes health
data (eg, A1C). Feedback from users indicated a desire to self-order and self-schedule services when they
become due. Using a similar approach and with strong institutional endorsement, we will design, usability test,
and evaluate a novel patient portal intervention to: (a) notify patients when selected, clinically-meaningful,
evidence-based diabetes monitoring & preventative services (eg, annual eye exam) become due and provide
reminders for timely completion, (b) promote understanding of the importance of these services through
literacy sensitive content, and (c) allow patients, when due by evidence-based guidelines, to ‘self-order’
(requires primary care physician (PCP) single-click co-signature) lab tests (eg, A1C) and vaccines prior to
doctor’s visits and self-schedule clinical services (eg, eye exam). Specifically, we aim to: (1) apply Design
Sprint methodology and usability testing to design and test a patient portal intervention (described above) that
can overcome patient and clinician/system barriers to completing evidence-based, clinically meaningful,
diabetes monitoring & preventative services among a diverse group of patients, (2) evaluate the effect of the
patient portal intervention developed in Aim 1 on the co...

## Key facts

- **NIH application ID:** 10249951
- **Project number:** 5R18DK123373-03
- **Recipient organization:** VANDERBILT UNIVERSITY MEDICAL CENTER
- **Principal Investigator:** William Martinez
- **Activity code:** R18 (R01, R21, SBIR, etc.)
- **Funding institute:** NIH
- **Fiscal year:** 2021
- **Award amount:** $651,608
- **Award type:** 5
- **Project period:** 2019-09-15 → 2024-06-30

## Primary source

NIH RePORTER: https://reporter.nih.gov/project-details/10249951

## Citation

> US National Institutes of Health, RePORTER application 10249951, Expanding Patient Engagement in Diabetes Care: Patient Portal Innovation (5R18DK123373-03). Retrieved via AI Analytics 2026-05-22 from https://api.ai-analytics.org/grant/nih/10249951. Licensed CC0.

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