The effectiveness of German disease management programs (DMPs) in patients with type 2 diabetes mellitus and coronary heart disease: results from an observational longitudinal study

BACKGROUND: Although the population-based German disease management programs (DMPs) for diabetes mellitus (DM) and coronary heart disease (CHD) are among the biggest worldwide, evidence on the effectiveness of these programs is still inconclusive or missing, particularly for high risk patients with comorbidities. The objective of this study was therefore to analyze the impact of DMPs on process and outcome parameters in patients with both, type 2 DM and CHD. METHODS: Analyses are based on two postal surveys of patients from the KORA myocardial infarction registry (southern Germany) with type 2 DM and on two postal validation studies with patients’ general physicians (2006, n = 312 and 2011, n = 212). The association between DMP enrollment (being enrolled in either DMP-DM or DMP-CHD) and guideline care (defined by several process indicators) at baseline (2006) and its development until follow-up (2011) was analyzed using logistic regression models accounting for the repeated measurements structure. The impact of DMP enrollment/guideline care on cumulated (quality-adjusted) life years ((QA)LYs) over a 4-year time horizon (2006–2010) was assessed using multiple linear regression methods. Logistic regression models were applied to analyze the association between DMP status and patient self-management at follow-up. RESULTS: Being enrolled in a DMP was associated with better guideline care at baseline [OR = 2.3 (95 % CI 1.27–4.03)], but not at follow-up [OR = 0.80 (95 % CI 0.40–1.58); p value for time-interaction <0.01]. DMP enrollment was not significantly [+0.15 LYs (95 % CI –0.07, 0.37); +0.06 QALYs (95 % CI –0.15, 0.26)], but treatment according to guideline care significantly [+0.40 LYs (95 % CI 0.21–0.60); +0.28 QALYs (95 % CI 0.10–0.45)] associated with higher (quality-adjusted) survival over the 4-year follow-up period. DMP enrollees further reported a somewhat better self-management than patients not being enrolled into a DMP. CONCLUSIONS: The results of this study concerning the effectiveness of DMPs in patients with DM and CHD are mixed, but are weakly in favor of DMPs. However, we found a clear positive impact of guideline care on quality adjusted survival in this patient group. The development of the association between DMP enrollment and guideline care over the follow-up time indicates some external effects, which should be the subject of further investigations. ELECTRONIC SUPPLEMENTARY MATERIAL: The online version of this article (doi:10.1186/s13098-015-0065-9) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.