About CERTs
Annual Report Year 1
Year 1 Progress
Developing Knowledge | Managing Risk | Improving Practice | Informing Policies | Program-wide Activities
Improving Practice
We aim to improve practice by educating people about the best ways to use therapies and aiding them in their efforts to translate such knowledge into action. Through research and demonstration projects, we are learning the best ways to achieve these aims.
Children and Adolescents
The prevalence of asthma increased by 38 percent from 1982 to 1996 in those under age 18, and even more among black children and teens. With several partners, we aim to bring to local physicians and their patients the tools they need for the best management of asthma.
We are offering a Summer Institute, Using the Evidence on Therapeutics to Enhance Quality of Care, that introduces pediatric caregivers to the process of evaluating the quality of evidence in the literature and provides practical ways to use evidence and decisionmaking tools in their practices. Our Web site also provides information for patients and caregivers.
Adults
About 1 million Americans at any given time are taking drugs called glucocorticoids. These drugs treat inflammatory conditions such as rheumatoid arthritis, asthma, and certain bowel disorders. Although helpful, glucocorticoids also can cause bone loss leading to osteoporosis. In fact, glucocorticoid use is the second-commonest cause of osteoporosis, after menopause.
Osteoporosis caused by glucocorticoid drugs is being underrecognized and undertreated among adults taking these drugs. We are planning an intervention to aid in prevention and treatment of this disorder.
A Web site (http://georgetowncert.org) is providing information for patients, pharmacists, and physicians about drug interactions and prescription drug use. Other sites offer tools to aid in prescribing. We also will be developing comprehensive educational programs for patients and caregivers about known interactions.
We have conducted a national survey of physicians in training, to identify the needs of such training programs in educating future caregivers on the prevention of drug errors. We already have identified an educational target: how to prevent adverse drug effects.