Community Care
The Regional Diabetes Foot Pathway creates a tiered system of specialist footcare for people
living with diabetes in the region. The service covers all aspect of diabetic footcare from the Tier 1
Screening Model through to Tier 2 Foot Protection Team (FPT), the Tier 3 acute based Enhanced
Foot Protection Team (EFPT) co-managing patients and the Tier 4 MDFPT in Belfast.
The Regional Diabetes Network drove the project forward and senior Podiatry staff from the Trust
sat on the Regional Diabetes Network.
Establishing the EFPT and the FPT has improved access to services and enabled improved care
pathways to be put in place for patients with diabetes.
Patients requiring enhanced intervention have benefitted from the dedicated resource in the EFPT
who have been able to provide timely intervention to those patients most at risk and those patients
with active ulceration. Patients have benefitted from the interface between the FPT, EFPT and
MDFPT which has enabled enhanced communication and referral links between the three tiers
and ability for immediate referral between the FPT and EFPT.
The EFPT have also been able to provide support to patients in the community, working with the
FPT to assess patients and provide expert advice and access to enhanced intervention without the
need for the patient to be seen in the acute setting. As a result of this over 16,000 patients were
seen as part of the pathway in 2019/2020.
'Podiatry helps to put the best foot forward'
- Implementation of the Diabetes Foot Pathway in South Eastern HSC Trust
Gail Thompson, Podiatry Team Lead
Acute Services; Fred McElwaine,
Consultant Diabetologist; Peter
Burbidge, Head of Podiatry Services;
Ann McBride, Principal Podiatrist.
Recruitment delays and the need to provide a training course for the Podiatry assistants to
deliver the Tier 1 Screening Model has led to delays in the implementation of this tier of the
model. Examinations were cancelled due to COVID-19, delaying implementation further.
The launch of the model has been shared in a national podiatry journal and was featured across
local news outlets. The continued development and continued funding of the model is paramount
as more and more people are being diagnosed with diabetes and subsequently require access to
the pathway.
NEXT STEPS
106 Goal 5: Integrating the Care - Community Care