Spreading Best Practices in Blood Pressure Control for African-American Patients

All practices participating in Better Health Greater Cleveland collect and submit data on patients? race, ethnicity and primary language every six months. The alliance stratifies ambulatory measures along several categories, enabling it to identify and address disparities in care and outcomes. One of the routine analyses of Better Health's data center identifies differences in the rates of blood pressure control among whites, Hispanics and Blacks, the three dominant racial and ethnic groups in Northeast Ohio. While rates of control for each group have increased, good control is improving faster in whites and Hispanics than in blacks. Better Health is working to speed the pace of improvement for Black patients. The alliance's latest report counts over 136,000 Northeast Ohio residents living with high blood pressure, treated in 56 practices in eight health systems. Achieving Better Health's 70 percent goal for region-wide blood pressure control for African American patients would improve this crucial measure for more than 2,800 patients. To address this need, Better Health has adapted an intervention from Kaiser Permanente's established curriculum into six monthly, hour-long training sessions to be delivered in clinics across the Better Health alliance.