Quality of Diabetic Foot Ulcer Care: Evaluation of an Interdisciplinary Wound Care Clinic Using an Extended Donabedian Model Based on a Retrospective Cohort Study

Objectives: Diabetic foot ulcer (DFU), a serious complication of diabetes, is associated with increased morbidity and mortality and presents a substantial socioeconomic burden. However, DFU quality of care has been insufficiently studied. Therefore, the aim of this study was to evaluate the quality of DFU care at an interdisciplinary wound care clinic in Canada, based on an extended Donabedian model: structure, process and outcome quality indicators combined with patient characteristics.

Methods: This was a retrospective cohort study of 140 adult patients with diabetes who were treated between 2012 and 2018 at a wound care clinic in a university-affiliated hospital in the Québec City area of Canada. Twenty-two internationally recognized quality-of-care indicators were identified from the literature. Data were collected from medical files, and the results were used to document the selected quality-of-care indicators.

Results: The principal indicators regarding structure and process were met, and outcome indicators were influenced by study population characteristics, particularly peripheral artery disease and critical limb ischemia. Moreover, this study highlights that quality-of-care indicators are essential when evaluating DFU outcomes, as structure and process indicators can also affect wound healing outcomes.

Conclusions: This study suggests that DFU care at a Canadian wound care clinic, with an interdisciplinary approach, meets most quality-of-care indicators. The socioeconomic burden of DFUs for patients, health-care organizations and policymakers, and the paucity of quality and performance evaluations, call for more studies evaluating DFU care.