Care coordination over time in medical homes for children with special health care needs.

Objectives: To explore how care coordination changes conceptually and practically in primary care practices when implementing the medical home and to identify reasons for different types of changes.

Methods: Six years after a 2003-2004 national learning collaborative to implement the medical home model for children with special health care needs, we examined care coordination in 12 pediatric practices with the highest postintervention Medical Home Index scores, indicating high level of adoption of the model. Data included interviews of 48 clinicians, care coordinators, and parents and medical record reviews of 60 patients with special health care needs receiving care in these practices.

Medical home transformation in pediatric primary care--what drives change?

Purpose: The aim of this study was to characterize essential factors to the medical home transformation of high-performing pediatric primary care practices 6 to 7 years after their participation in a national medical home learning collaborative.

Methods: We evaluated the 12 primary care practice teams having the highest Medical Home Index (MHI) scores after participation in a national medical home learning collaborative with current MHI scores, a clinician staff questionnaire (assessing adaptive reserve), and semistructured interviews. We reviewed factors that emerged from interviews and analyzed domains and subdomains for their agreement with MHI and adaptive reserve domains and subthemes using a process of triangulation.

Improvement in the family-centered medical home enhances outcomes for children and youth with special healthcare needs.

Family-centered, coordinated, comprehensive, and culturally competent care for children and youth with special healthcare needs is a national priority. Access to a primary care medical home is a US Maternal and Child Health Bureau performance measure. Most primary care practices lack methods by which to partner with families and improve care.

Practice-based care coordination: a medical home essential.

Families who raise children and youth with special health care needs deserve a medical home. They expect a team approach to health care, with coordination across multiple services and settings. Children, youth, and families benefit from the organization of critical information into written care summaries and action plans.

Redefining primary pediatric care for children with special health care needs: the primary care medical home.

Purpose Of Review: As considerations of the quality of health care have matured, the role of pediatric primary care providers and models for the delivery of primary care have received growing attention. Particularly for children with chronic conditions, the need for proactive, planned, and coordinated care delivered in partnership with consumers has become more apparent. The primary care medical home has emerged as a model favored by national organizations representing pediatricians and family physicians as well as national public health policy makers, yet implementation of this model remains limited and the evidence base for its value is not yet highly developed.

Building medical homes: improvement strategies in primary care for children with special health care needs.

Families and professionals agree that children and adolescents need access to community-based medical homes. This is especially true for children with special health care needs (CSHCN). Most primary care practices are designed for children's routine preventive and acute care needs.