2022: MOHW Procurement of Consultancy Service to Develop Jamaica’s Guidelines for the Management of Diabetes, Hypertension and Asthma – Prof Trevor Ferguson

Hypertension diabetes mellitus, and asthma are major public health problems in Jamaica. These three conditions have high prevalence in Jamaica are leading causes of morbidity and mortality. A major problem is that awareness, treatment and control rates for both diabetes and hypertension are low. Asthma imposes a major burden on the public health care system with hospital emergency rooms seeing large numbers of patients with acute exacerbations of asthma requiring the creation of ‘Asthma Bays’ in local hospital emergency rooms.

While local clinical guidelines have been prepared in the past, these are now outdated and implementation in the past was suboptimal. The preparation and implementation of up-to-date comprehensive evidence based clinical practice guidelines, tailored to the local context will help to mitigate adverse outcomes related to these conditions. The guidelines to be developed under this consultancy will provide evidence-based up-to-date clinical practice guidelines for the management of diabetes, hypertension, and asthma and will include information on appropriate screening, prevention and management in primary care settings, an overview of the management of acute emergency situations, and aspects of management of the hospitalized patient.

Investigators: Principal Investigator: Trevor Ferguson (Hypertension Lead). Co-Investigators: Marshall Tulloch-Reid (Diabetes Lead), Jennifer Knight-Madden (Asthma Lead), Georgiana Gordon-Strachan, Monika Asnani, Lesley King, Simon Anderson, Lisa Hurlock, Raquel Lowe-Jones, Patrice

Sponsor: Ministry of Health and Wellness, Jamaica