Ix & the Patient-Centered Medical Home
By Josh Seidman | Popularity: 43%At the 7th Annual Ix Conference, “Next-Generation Patient-Centered Care,” we are having a track on the second day about The Role of Ix in Enabling the Patient-Centered Medical Home. We’ll have quite varied perspectives on the topic, ranging from the American College of Physicians to innovative implementers.
One of the big questions that will be addressed by Kaiser Permanente physician David Sobel (a guru for decades in health education and engaging consumers in managing their own care) is, “Who’s the PCP in the patient-centered medical home?” and “whose home is it anyway?” Here’s the abstract for his session:
Who’s the PCP in the Patient-Centered Medical Home?
David Sobel, MD, MPHWhose home is it anyway? And is anyone home? A true patient-centered approach recognizes the patient as the true primary care provider and the true medical home needs to be designed and built with patient involvement. What are the basic structural requirements for a patient-centered medical home to serve patient’s need for information, care, and psychological support? How can emerging technologies allow for remodeling of the home? And how can subcontractors (i.e., health professionals) be managed and retrained to allow for co-habitation and true partnership? What skills do home-owners need? Finally, even if the financing and incentive issues could be solved (e.g. in a prepaid group practice), what walls still exist to co-ownership of the medical home and how can these walls be remodeled?
David always taks a thoughtful and provocative approach, and I think it will be a good way to frame the debate.
Other faculty for this track include:
- Rushika Fernandopulle, MD, MPP, Co-Founder, Renaissance Health (Track Chair)
- Michael Barr, MD, MBA, Vice President, Practice Advocacy & Improvement, American College of Physicians
- Ted Eytan, MD, MS, MPH, Medical Director, Health Informatics and Web Services, Group Health Cooperative
- Kerry Meyer, PhD, ARNP, RN, Care Manager, Valley Medical Center, who will be presenting with one Valley’s patients
If you’re interested in seeing what the real opportunities are for patient-centered medical homes, come to the conference next week (June 12-13) at the Newseum in Washington, DC.
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June 4th, 2008 at 12:09 pm
Dave–
Dave, thanks so much for this. In our convenience oriented, instant service economy, most people take health for granted, until a life event makes medical needs a priorty. In this crisis, we go on to navigate the obscure provider- centric medical world with considerable trepidation, and little guide posts. This crisis is usually the patient-centric moment in which we can introduce in our world where we know something about optimizing health, and have tools for people to prevent, identify, and manage their chronic illnesses. Women, more accustomed to the medical world through reproductive health contacts, may be an example of the steady introduction of health services over a 20 year period of time.
I think we should be introducting some of the tools of self care early, as we are doing with smoking and sex education: should every teen leave high school knowing how to take a blood pressure? Since asthma can be very subtle diseases, should we be asking kids have you stopped running like you used to? Should we be asking everyone if they snore, or fall asleep easily during the day…? If they are not enjoying life like they used to, or down or blue alot of the time? Should every teen take a health risk apprasial?
That’s the ‘push part.’ Dave is right, we need to work with, and as patients, as people, looking at how we can make health part of ‘home.’ That is using technology available now, and as some employers are doing, using incentives to help people get involved with their health. Start with a single condition, like hypertension, since, more than other measures, is the strongest current indicator of future organ health. Easy to teach, tools are comparatively cheap, and given the shifting of health care costs more to individuals, many people are motivated to make lifestyle changes to avoid medication.
We buy cars/CDs/IPODS from our living rooms. We need more focus on the home and it’s details, as the center of health, to arrange care according to patients lives/lifestyles, and develop care strategies that are interactive, allowing patients to make changes, and feedback quickly and predictively the impact of those changes. The medical/industrial complex is not the center of care, just the center of cost accounting. The center of care, the provider of care 99% of the time, is the patient. Let’s ask them what works.
June 4th, 2008 at 2:17 pm
Paulanne,
I agree with you–not only that the patient is the center of care, but also that he/she is the only one who can really be the one expert on what’s going on with that individual person (except–in some cases–that person’s family member/caregiver). The more complex the situation (and the more different providers involved), the more that’s true.
I think what we are always trying to do at the IxCenter and certainly at next week’s Ix conference is figure out how to provide infrastructure and support to make that easier to do.
Josh
June 5th, 2008 at 6:58 pm
This reads to be an interesting conference. It refreshing to read about the medical community re-orienting back towards the patient in their home as the place of care.