Team-based care to improve control of hypertension in an inner city practice

The purpose of this case study was to identify which intervention or interventions, if any, resulted in improved hypertension control in an intercity public practice.Data includes interventions, graphed chronologically and the results in the form of percentage of patients with controlled hypertension.Challenges to success included understaffing of the practice and significantly limited access to appointments. Also, the variety of patients' languages and cultures presented a challenge.We reached our target of 60% of patients meeting criteria for control of hypertension. Although we instituted several interventions and all cumulatively contributed to the outcome, the two likely to be most effective were the establishment of hypertension-only appointments with either primary providers or with nurses. Both of these interventions resulted in an increased number of available appointments and improved access to timely follow up.