Project Description
In May 2008, The Commonwealth Fund, Qualis Health and the MacColl Center for Health Care Innovation at the Group Health Research Institute initiated a five-year demonstration project to help primary care safety net sites become high-performing patient-centered medical homes (PCMHs) and achieve benchmark levels of quality, efficiency and patient experience.
The goal of the Safety Net Medical Home Initiative (the Initiative) was to develop and demonstrate a replicable and sustainable implementation model for medical home transformation. The Initiative called for partnerships between safety net providers and community stakeholders to work together toward a new model of primary care delivery that is recognized and rewarded for its holistic approach to patient care. Policy activation is critical in this transformation, and all partners in this Initiative were expected to participate in Medicaid and other policy reform efforts in their respective regions.
The Initiative received applications for participation from 42 organizations in 31 states. Five "Regional Coordinating Centers" were selected, and each partnered with 10 to 15 primary care safety net sites in their respective states: Colorado, Idaho, Massachusetts, Oregon and Pennsylvania. These collaboratives received funding from the Initiative to support practice coaches ("Medical Home Facilitators"), as well as technical assistance, resources and tools on practice redesign topics such as enhanced access, care coordination and patient experience. To learn more about a Regional Coordinating Center, please select its region from the About the Initiative menu.
The Initiative developed a framework for PCMH transformation, the "Change Concepts for Practice Transformation." Change concepts are general ideas used to stimulate specific, actionable steps that lead to improvement. All materials produced by the Initiative are in the public domain. This site provides access to implementation guides, assessment tools, presentations and other materials on the Change Concepts, as well as resources on payment and recognition. Access these tools.
A special supplement to the journal Medical Care presents the progress and lessons learned from the SNMHI. Access the articles here.
Download a snapshot of the Initiative's achievements and review an outline of the free resources and tools that the SNMHI has published.