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International Journal of Telemedicine and Applications
Volume 2012 (2012), Article ID 103685, 8 pages
doi:10.1155/2012/103685
Lessons Learned from Implementing the Patient-Centered Medical Home
1University of Delaware, 416C Purnell Hall, Newark, DE 19711, USA
2Carilion Clinic, Roanoke, VA 24014, USA
3George Mason University, Fairfax, VA 22030, USA
4Arlington Innovation Center for Health Research, Virginia Tech, National Capital Region, Arlington, VA 22203, USA
Received 1 February 2012; Revised 4 June 2012; Accepted 22 June 2012
Academic Editor: Sotiris A. Pavlopoulos
Copyright © 2012 Ellen P. Green et al. This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
Abstract
The Patient-Centered Medical Home (PCMH) is a primary care model that provides coordinated and comprehensive care to patients to improve health outcomes. This paper addresses practical issues that arise when transitioning a traditional primary care practice into a PCMH recognized by the National Committee for Quality Assurance (NCQA). Individual organizations' experiences with this transition were gathered at a PCMH workshop in Alexandria, Virginia in June 2010. An analysis of their experiences has been used along with a literature review to reveal common challenges that must be addressed in ways that are responsive to the practice and patients’ needs. These are: NCQA guidance, promoting provider buy-in, leveraging electronic medical records, changing office culture, and realigning workspace in the practice to accommodate services needed to carry out the intent of PCMH. The NCQA provides a set of standards for implementing the PCMH model, but these standards lack many specifics that will be relied on in location situations. While many researchers and providers have made critiques, we see this vagueness as allowing for greater flexibility in how a practice implements PCMH.