{"id":597382,"date":"2026-04-10T07:05:12","date_gmt":"2026-04-10T07:05:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/597382\/"},"modified":"2026-04-10T07:05:12","modified_gmt":"2026-04-10T07:05:12","slug":"diabetes-referrals-lost-in-the-fog-says-new-study","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/597382\/","title":{"rendered":"Diabetes referrals lost in the fog says new study"},"content":{"rendered":"

New research has found significant care gaps in follow-up of newly diagnosed diabetes patients.<\/p>\n

Referrals for\u00a0patients with\u00a0newly-diagnosed\u00a0diabetes\u00a0have\u00a0been put under the\u00a0microscope in\u00a0new research from the University of Sydney<\/a>\u00a0which examined uptake of\u00a0Medicare-funded\u00a0allied health services.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The\u00a0study highlighted a crucial information gap in chronic condition care,\u00a0with reports of widespread underutilisation of pre-existing services within the first two years of diagnosis.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cOur research shows there\u00a0is very substantial underuse of those lifestyle and self-management support services,\u201d\u00a0said\u00a0lead researcher\u00a0Emma Cox.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat that is pointing to is a lack of referral to these services by GPs.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re recommending\u00a0\u2026\u00a0GPs to be\u00a0better\u00a0educated around the value of these services, and for early referral to these services to be mandated.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

Barriers\u00a0to referrals were identified\u00a0as\u00a0a combination of systemic failures and a lack of patient awareness.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat has emerged from those is that there is a high administrative burden associated with care planning, and that is one barrier that GPs are facing around referring patients to allied health services,\u201d\u00a0Ms\u00a0Cox\u00a0said.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cThe government has just made some changes under the new\u00a0Strengthening\u00a0Medicare reforms, and\u00a0they\u2019ve\u00a0consolidated\u00a0this process to try and streamline referrals to allied health.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cBut this\u00a0isn\u2019t\u00a0the only barrier, so the other strategies are needed as well to help increase use of these services.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cOne of those main barriers is the out-of-pocket costs for those services.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re recommending an increase in the Medicare rebate for\u00a0allied\u00a0health\u00a0services, and that\u2019s going to help reduce that out-of-pocket cost and make it more financially viable for allied health professionals to deliver the service.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

\t\t\tRelated\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

The study\u00a0found\u00a0current referral rates\u00a0did\u00a0not align with type 2 diabetes management guidelines.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Only 16.9% of\u00a0newly diagnosed\u00a0patients\u00a0included in\u00a0the study\u00a0had accessed a Medicare-funded dietitian, whilst just\u00a06% accessed a CDE or exercise physiologist within the first two years post diagnosis.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Dietitians have also expressed a reluctance to accept referrals\u00a0because\u00a0current Medicare rebates only cover consultations\u00a0that are too short to properly address patent needs,\u00a0according to the study.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cA noted limitation of the study was that it\u00a0was not able to\u00a0investigate privately funded services, prompting the need for further research to obtain a more comprehensive scope of the issue.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cThis study couldn\u2019t necessarily determine whether someone had been referred to allied health and then not used the service, or if they just hadn\u2019t had any Allied Health Service use,\u201d researcher\u00a0and study co-author Dr\u00a0Gideon Meyerowitz-Katz\u00a0said.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cOnly 67% of the people with diabetes had a GP management plan.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cWhy that\u2019s less than 100% and why it is so much lower for some of the key types of\u00a0allied\u00a0health\u00a0service utilisation that we would look for is hard to say.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"New research has found significant care gaps in follow-up of newly diagnosed diabetes patients. Referrals for\u00a0patients with\u00a0newly-diagnosed\u00a0diabetes\u00a0have\u00a0been put…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":597383,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[64,63,19820,1835,137,337],"class_list":{"0":"post-597382","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-health","8":"tag-au","9":"tag-australia","10":"tag-clinical","11":"tag-diabetes","12":"tag-health","13":"tag-research"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/597382","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=597382"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/597382\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/597383"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=597382"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=597382"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=597382"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}