Health Empirics

There has been a growing demand for comprehensive studies on the management of type II diabetes in Indian settings. This paper presents a case study demonstrating how electronic medical records (EMR) from a community covered under the Contributory Health Services Scheme (CHSS) can help address important research gaps in diabetes care and management. The Hospital Information Management System (HIMS), which covers 89,204 CHSS beneficiaries, records every interaction between beneficiaries and healthcare providers. Using this database, a cohort of 835 patients newly diagnosed with diabetes during 2011–2012 was identified, and their 10-year medical history following diagnosis was reconstructed. For comparison, a cohort of 1,670 age- and sex-matched non-diabetic beneficiaries with similar longitudinal medical histories was also created. This cost-effective cohort dataset enabled researchers to examine several issues related to diabetes incidence and management, including the risk of diabetes in the community, transitions between non-diabetic, pre-diabetic, and diabetic stages, excess morbidity among diabetic patients, and seasonal variations in glycaemic levels. The findings underline the significant potential of EMR-based cohort reconstruction for understanding diabetes risk, progression, and management in community settings.