Medical Home FAQs

What is a medical home?

• A medical home is not a building, house, hospital, or home healthcare service, but rather an approach to providing comprehensive primary care.
• In a medical home, the pediatric care team works in partnership with a child and a child's family to assure that all of the medical and non-medical needs of the patient are met.
• Through this partnership, the pediatric care team helps the family and patient access, coordinate, and understand their child's care.
• A medical home helps families and patients to connect with specialty care, educational services, out-of-home care, family support, and other public and private community services that are important for the health of the child and family.

What is the family-centered care component of the medical home?

Family-centered care is a partnership between families and health care professionals. It involves a respectful relationship between the family and clinician that honors the following:

• Strengths
• Cultures
• Traditions
• Expertise that everyone brings to the table

Family-centered care is an integral component of the medical home approach to care. Research suggests that family-centered care improves the following:

• The patient and family experience with health care
• Reduces Stress
• Improves communication
• Reduces conflict (including lawsuits)
• Improves the health of children with chronic health conditions

What evidence is there that shows providing care within a medical home model helps to save money?

Evidence indicates the medical home model of care improves quality, which in turn lends towards cost savings and improved health outcomes across the system of care. Evidence also supports other benefits such as decreased emergency department visits and increased provider and patient satisfaction. The Maternal and Child Health(MCH) Evidence center compiled a list of evidence-based strategies to advance the medical home model of care within state Title V programs. Learn more by visiting their website here.

If you have specific technical assistance needs related to medical home implementation or policy/system-level support, contact the National Center for a System of Services for CYSHCN.

Several programs exist that recognize and/or accredit health care organizations as medical homes, according to specific sets of standards. A health care organization's selection of which program to pursue should be based on what best fits its needs.

There are many reasons why health care organizations choose to apply for recognition/certification, such as enhanced payment. Before beginning the recognition/certification process, health care organizations should consider their organization's capacity (staffing, resources, and time).

A practice does not need to be recognized and/or accredited as a medical home in order to provide care based on the core tenants of the medical home. The Joint Principles for Patient-Centered Medical Home—created by the American Academy of Pediatrics, the American Academy of Family Physicians, the American College of Physicians, and the American Osteopathic Association—outline guidelines for a medical home.

The National Center for Medical Home Implementation does not have practicing pediatricians on staff to respond to parent requests regarding individual medical conditions or questions about American Academy of Pediatrics policy statements. The best resource for this information is a child's primary care clinician.

If your child does not have a primary care clinician, search the HealthyChildren.org "Find a Pediatrician or Pediatric Specialist" database, or contact the physician referral service at your local hospital or county medical society.

The National Center for Medical Home Implementation (National Center) does not make referrals to families for a medical home, nor does the National Center recognize, certify, or accredit practices as medical homes. The National Center does, however, track information on projects and initiatives related to medical home that occur in states, which can be found on the National Center state pages.

To find a listing of practices in your state that have achieved recognition and/or accreditation, visit the Web site of that particular recognition/accreditation program.

For example, the National Committee for Quality Assurance, allows visitors to search for practices by state that have obtained Patient-Centered Medical Home recognition.

The National Center for Medical Home Implementation offers a large number of resources which explain medical home for patients and families in the "For Families" and the "Communicating the Medical Home" pages of the Web site.

Information for parents and others is also available in English and Spanish on HealthyChildren.org.