The perspectives of health care providers and staff on the usefulness of a diabetes registry

• Objective: To obtain the perspectives of health care providers and staff on the usefulness of a chronic disease registry. • Methods: Explanatory sequential mixed-methods design with a survey sent to all health care providers and staff registry users throughout the Penn State system followed by 10 interviews and 4 focus groups to follow up on survey responses. Descriptive statistics and correlations were run for the survey data. Provider and staff survey responses were compared using a Wilcoxon test. A thematic analysis was performed on transcripts of the interviews and focus groups. • Results: Providers and staff were generally satisfied with the registry and felt that it increased the efficiency of the diabetes patient visit. Themes identified in the interviews and focus groups included (1) quality improvements, (2) efficiency, (3) research applicability, and (4) implementation challenges. • Conclusion: The use of a chronic disease registry can be advantageous in clinical care and can help with adherence to evidence-based guidelines, quality improvement, efficiency, clinical organization of health care delivery, and academic research.