8 ways Onduo virtual care optimizes diabetes management for health plan members

Over 38 million people in the United States (U.S.) have diabetes, and nearly 9 million of them are undiagnosed.¹ The individuals who have been diagnosed were likely given a diabetes management plan — a care plan of all the lifestyle changes, medications, devices and supplies, additional screenings, diabetes checkups and self-care instructions to treat their condition. And all this, clearly defined to facilitate reaching blood glucose targets, limiting complications, mitigating comorbidities, such as heart disease, and sustaining a trajectory to better health. 

Ideally, every person would also receive a tailored plan, since no person is alike, and therefore, nor should their care plans be. And from there, they would easily understand, access, adopt and keep up with their regimen, blazing away without roadblocks on this healthier path with diabetes. 

However, the reality is, the world of diabetes management is imperfect with many barriers and gaps — limited access, social factors, poor health literacy and inequities, medication nonadherence, dwindling healthcare provider pools and more, such as clinicians lacking essential time, resources and comprehensive medical records and patient data. Resultant interactions and interventions may be inadequately informed or one-size-fits-all and episodic or reactive, leading to a gambit of poor outcomes. 

Essentially, despite strides in understanding and treatment advancements, diabetes management challenges and complexities endure. Fortunately, there’s light in this dark tunnel.

Imagine illuminating journeys to simpler diabetes management for each individual, using multi-source data and easy-to-use tech to personalize their care experience for more meaningful insights, adaptive interventions and better self-management. Then envision helping overcome adherence and health literacy challenges, inequities and access limitations by placing daily, trusted health coaching and expert, specialist* care in the palms and pockets of anyone managing diabetes. 

Onduo, Verily’s precision, virtual care solution, may help realize this. Onduo combines advanced technology and data science with compassionate, knowledgeable care teams — including board-certified endocrinologists* — to connect with each member and provide tailored, timely evidence-based support in the crucial moments between primary healthcare provider visits**, because every step counts on paths to better health.

Read on for details on eight ways Onduo optimizes diabetes management for health plan members, while fostering healthier plans, too. 

1. Data-driven, personalized care
2. Better self-management
3. Dedicated care teams
4. Factoring in social determinants

5. Medication management
6. In-app specialist access*
7. Evidence-based outcomes
8. Robust health plan support

Through a precision, virtual care solution, Onduo helps people better manage type 1 or 2 diabetes and comorbid hypertension. We also offer solutions for prediabetes and healthy weight through partnership with Good Measures. 

Individuals access Onduo through a user-friendly app, offering evidence-based^† support for health plan members to help make managing complex conditions simpler. And it’s worth repeating, Onduo compliments primary healthcare,** bridging gaps between scheduled check ups.

Members can manage chronic care — anytime anywhere

Diabetes management inclusions: 

• Intuitive app
• Multi-level care team 
• In-app specialist access* 
• Library of health education
• Full type 2 diabetes management in Spanish 
• Connected devices, such as continuous glucose monitors
• 24/7 insights on diet, physical activity and more

By analyzing multi-source data, Onduo offers personalized experiences and interventions delivered through the app and dedicated care teams. It’s precision care for diabetes management that’s backed by demonstrated glycosylated hemoglobin (A1C) outcomes and more.³

Precision care means we build personalized plans for members and their own health journeys, addressing key components of diabetes management, such as physical activity, diet and medication, along with clinical needs and other key factors for real success and greater health equity, such as personal preferences and social determinants of health (SDoH). 

Managing diabetes isn't simply controlling a disease, it’s managing the health of the whole person. As such, Onduo approaches health holistically, consulting with members on meal planning, sleep, lifestyle and stress on their terms for enabling self-care and positive changes. 

Data-driven, personalized journeys

Born from Google and Alphabet, Verily is a leader in data science. This expertise enables Onduo, as Verily’s data-driven, virtual care management solution, to combine health data from payors, members and connected devices, such as continuous glucose monitors* — or CGMs — for informing clinical decisions and powering individualized diabetes management. 

Here’s how it works (image text):

1. Onduo’s data aggregation engine combines members’ clinical priorities with “signals”, such as labs, medications, family history and healthcare provider input. 
2. Members’ risk level is calculated, segmenting from the combined data and facilitating how coaches prioritize outreach and care. 
3. Members navigate data-fueled experiences optimized for their health, including dynamic coaching outreach and in-app activities.

This data-driven approach starts with the data aggregation engine and positively impacts every member touchpoint — from informing tailored engagement, enrollment and retention outreach to fueling, precision in-app and care team interactions, as described above.

Empowering diabetes self-management 

Onduo also makes self-reporting simple, nudging members to input and track medication, meals, blood glucose readings, and more, such as integrating connected devices with the Onduo app conveniently on their smartphones. 

This activity can contribute to greater condition knowledge, such as how diet and physical activity affects blood glucose, and more meaningful insights to support better self-management and lasting, healthier habits. Onduo helps to make doing the right thing, the easy thing, which is beneficial for people overwhelmed by the complexities of diabetes management. 

A peer-reviewed, 4-month prospective study in adults with uncontrolled type 2 diabetes showed participating in Onduo virtual care management with intermittent continuous glucose monitor use improved self-care by increasing understanding and engagement in their own health and care plan per real-time views of how lifestyle factors impacted blood glucose levels.³ View research insights.

Building trust with dedicated care teams 

Onduo is high tech, but it’s also high touch, with dedicated care teams of health coaches and healthcare professionals, offering registered dietitian, board-certified specialist* and pharmacist support — all collaborating with each member and their unique diabetes management plan. Care teams are also trained in empathy-based care and behavior-change modalities, creating trusted, essential relationships to better engage and support.

Listen to Onduo member Steve Aubrey describe how connecting with his care team inspired better self-care on his personalized path to a “brighter future” with diabetes.^‡

Factoring in SDoH to foster health equity 

Onduo strives to achieve health equity for diabetes management in communities facing SDoH challenges. Some methods and efforts include: 

• Applying evidence-based guidance, resources and coaching
• Supporting health literacy through care teams consultations and specially-curated in-app content and materials that follow readability, inclusivity and suitability best practices 
• Offering a full type 2 diabetes management program in Spanish, along with telephonic support for speakers of over 200 languages
• Building healthcare products and member experiences for accessibility and inclusivity
• Enabling access to expert health coaching and specialty care*

Learn about Verily’s Health Equity Center of Excellence and our mission of catalyzing the creation of products designed with, and for, diverse populations. 

Closing gaps through medication management

Although addressing diet, physical activity, sleep and stress are key to diabetes management, people with type 2 diabetes typically need blood glucose-lowering medications to reach their goals. And managing type 1 diabetes means using insulin, period. 

Drug-related problems — adverse events, drug interactions and non-adherence due to cost or confusion and more — are also common as people may have multiple conditions, take many drugs, get them from numerous sources and see various healthcare providers.

Onduo care teams help close care gaps, such as preventive medications, or identify savings options through medication reviews with members and Surescripts® pharmacy integration data. And teams help members prevent and overcome barriers, such as side effects and adherence issues, to stay on track through primary healthcare collaboration, in-app notifications^β and pharmacist consults.

An external analysis, the Diabetes Care Survey, showed 46% of people with type 2 diabetes don’t see their healthcare provider as recommended.⁵ This gap can contribute to poor outcomes and therapeutic inertia, which is failing to intensify blood-glucose lowering medications when a person hasn’t met their glycemic targets.⁶ And with type 1 diabetes, easier access to specialists is also crucial, since insulin regimens — injected through a needle, pen or pump — aren’t only necessary to thrive, but to live. 

Onduo members can access one-on-one specialist consultations* for timely, expert guidance through their smartphones. During in-app telehealth appointments in the Onduo virtual care clinic, in-house endocrinologists can also optimize medication and insulin regimens according to the latest guidelines — the American Diabetes Association Standard of Care in Diabetes — which also emphasizes prescribing for patient-centric factors.⁶

Medication optimization examples:

• Changing doses to curb therapeutic inertia or minimize side effects
• Adjusting for affordability to improve adherence 
• Deprescribing to eliminate unnecessary or duplicate drugs
• Modifying to address blood glucose control, and other health risks, such as heart disease

A1C is the gold standard lab test to screen for and diagnose diabetes (typically with other labs, such as fasting blood glucose and glucose-tolerance tests), gauge disease severity, and monitor progress and treatment response. A1C gives a picture of average blood glucose control over the past two to three months. 

Onduo is a virtual diabetes care management solution backed by demonstrated A1C outcomes and more. A peer-reviewed, 4-month prospective study of Onduo virtual care management with intermittent continuous glucose monitor use in adults with uncontrolled type 2 diabetes demonstrated significant improvements in A1C and other glycemic and heart disease-related biomarkers.³ See select study outcomes in the figure below. Explore more research insights.

Offering Onduo virtual care as part of health plans’ benefits packages can help optimize diabetes management for members through data-fueled, personalized care plans, dedicated care teams, evidence-based outcomes and beyond. 

Onduo can best support healthier plans, too — excelling in the market as one solution for managing multiple chronic conditions and other differentiators: 

• HQAA® and URAC® accreditations
• ASO sales training and support 
• Clinical excellence and privacy champions 
• Proven A1C outcomes³, suggesting ROI⁸

As stated, evidence demonstrates Onduo can significantly decrease A1C in adults with uncontrolled type 2 diabetes, making it a wise investment in members’ health.³

Data analysis sourced from externally published literature infers it may also be a wise investment in health plans’ financial health.⁸ The published, external analysis reported a financial return on investment (ROI) from programs that reduce A1C by 1% — both commercially insured and Medicare populations.⁸

View more ways Onduo stacks up against competitors. And click the arrow below to discuss ROI projections and other details for your org with an Onduo expert.

Sources

1. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). National Diabetes Statistics Report. CDC Website. https://www.cdc.gov/diabetes/data/statistics-report/index.html. Updated: November 29, 2023. Accessed: February 23, 2024. 
2. Verily Onduo internal analysis of data on file.  
3. Majithia AR, Kusiak CM, Improved Glycemic Outcomes in Adults With Type 2 Diabetes Participating in a Continuous Glucose Monitor Driven Virtual Diabetes Clinic: Prospective Trial. J Med Internet Res. 2020;22(8):e21778. doi:10.2196/21778 n=55; 60 days intermittent CGM wear, n=43
4. U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Disease. Every Person with Diabetes Needs Ongoing Self-Management Education and Support. NIDDK website. https://www.niddk.nih.gov/health-information/professionals/diabetes-discoveries-practice/diabetes-self-management-education-support. Updated: July 10, 2019. Accessed: February 23, 2024.
5. Smart Meter, LLC. Forty-Six Percent of Adults with Type 2 Diabetes Don't See Their Physicians as Often as Recommended. PR Newswire Website. https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/forty-six-percent-of-adults-with-type-2-diabetes-dont-see-their-physicians-as-often-as-recommended-301673834.html. Updated: November 10, 2022. Accessed: February 23, 2023. 
6. American Diabetes Association. Standards of Care in Diabetes - 2023. Diabetes Care. 2023 Jan 1;46(Supplement_1):S1-S291 PDF.
7. David Harlan, MD, Chief Scientific Officer and Co-founder Stability Health. The U.S. Endocrinologist Shortage: Understanding the Issue. Stability Health Website. Updated: Not listed. Accessed: February 23, 2024. 
8. Fitch K, Pyenson BS, Iwasaki K. Medical claim cost impact of improved diabetes control for medicare and commercially insured patients with type 2 diabetes. J Manag Care Pharm. 2013 Oct;19(8):609-20, 620a-620d. doi: 10.18553/jmcp.2013.19.8.609. 

Disclaimers

Onduo offers certain care management and coordinated clinical care programs for eligible individuals. Onduo LLC and a network of affiliated professional entities (collectively, "Onduo") collaborate to offer the services. Onduo services are meant to be used in conjunction with regular in-person clinical services and not intended to replace routine primary care. 

To preserve member privacy, people pictured are not actual Onduo members. 

Good Measures® is a registered trademark of Good Measures, LLC.

* When clinically indicated 

** The Onduo app is not intended as a substitute for individuals' primary care physicians' care or guidance. Onduo members must discuss their treatment plan with said providers before making major lifestyle changes.

† Engagement calculated based on an internal analysis using the following formula: [Number of enrollees engaged with the application]/[Total number of enrollees]

‡ Member may, or may not, be current Onduo member. Testimonials are provided by members of the Onduo program via paid sponsorship. The opinions reflect our members' personal experiences with the program. Results may vary and are not guaranteed.

β Not intended for use as a medication reminder system. Members should defer to their prescribing physician's instructions. Members should review and adjust their in-app medication list to avoid incorrect notifications.