| The purpose of CMHI activities is to create opportunities for parents and professionals to form quality improvement teams to build and strengthen medical homes.
CMHI intervention elements at the primary care level are based upon a model of parent professional partnership of quality improvement. (See Quality Improvement Section in the Medical Home Improvment Kit)
A quality improvement team includes:
- A lead pediatrician/primary care provider
- A key non-MD office staff member/care coordinator
parent partners (at least 2)
- A commitment of time
- A quality improvement process
- Supportive facilitation/consultation
- Opportunities for collaborative learning
Family and professional partnerships form the overarching theme of CMHI activities.The focus is upon strategies that define the primary care role in the management of children with special health care needs. Many primary care activities are generic (not condition specific) such as family support, practice or office-based care coordination, vertical communication within health care systems, horizontal communication among other agencies and resources (schools, early intervention, payers and state agencies), information and education, and advocacy.Primary health care and especially reimbursement systems support of traditional individual provider-patient encounters, so that other important Medical Home services and activities are not easily integrated.
What is needed is a new set of primary care behaviors called Chronic Condition Management (CCM) which serve children and families who use the health care system most often and expand services to include:
- Care coordination
- Information Exchange
- Family Education and Advocacy
We invite you to dowload and read:
Cooley, W.C. and McAllister, J.W., Building Medical Homes: Improvement Strategies in Primary Care for Children With Special Health Care Needs. Pediatrics 2004; 113: 1499-1506.
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