At the time this article was written, Tiffany Quach was a Registered Nurse and Michele Goldschmidt was the Health Promotion and Disease Prevention Program Manager, both at Veterans Affairs Portland Healthcare System in Oregon. Tiffany Quach was a doctoral Nurse Practitioner Student at Gonzaga University School of Nursing and Human Physiology in Spokane, Washington. Correspndence: Tiffany Quach (tiffanyvquach@gmail.com)
Author disclosures The authors report no actual or potential conflicts of interest with regard to this article.
Disclaimer The opinions expressed herein are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect those of Federal Practitioner, Frontline Medical Communications Inc., the U.S. Government, or any of its agencies.
The goal of the VAPORHCS Comprehensive Foot Care program is to provide veterans with a program that is predictable, easy and consistent to prevent and treat foot ulcers to reduce the rate of lower limb amputations. It requires multidisciplinary team collaboration for success. Implementation of this new comprehensive program has increased the number of accurate annual foot exams, ARAs and podiatry referrals. Despite these improvements, areas of future improvement include emphasizing patient education and ongoing provider compliance with annual assessments.
Author contributions MHG proposed the program evaluation project idea. TVQ collected and analyzed the data and wrote the manuscript. MHG oversaw the project and edited the manuscript. TVQ is the guarantor of this project and takes responsibility for the contents of this journal article.
Acknowledgments The authors thank Tyra Haebe, VAPORHCS Prevention of Amputation in Veterans Everywhere (PAVE) Manager, and the entire VAPORHCS PAVE committee for their support in this program evaluation project.
