How will PCMH (Patient Centered Medical Home) affect my child’s visits to the office?
We previously discussed how research has found that data collection using a good process helps make better decisions and improves outcomes, reduces costs and provides higher patient satisfaction. When we send data to your insurance carriers, we not only report services provided but also the results found. In order to capture all of your child’s health data, we are now reporting on every service performed, including both acute (sick) visits or routine Preventive Care visits.
Preventive Care or Well Child visits include the following:
o Age and gender appropriate history
o Physical Examination
o Counseling (Brief-5 minutes)
o Anticipatory guidance (age specific expectations for development, nutrition, safety, etc)
o Ordering standard laboratory and/or diagnostic procedures
o Routine follow up of stable chronic conditions.
At times, you may have additional new concerns or changes to existing conditions. When that information is reported to the insurance carriers, it may be determined that those issues are outside the standard for a preventive visit and require that you pay for part of that service. More details on this process are found in the letter that we’ve sent to all families recently. If you can’t find a copy of the letter, you may call or send us a portal message.
Please feel free to call the office with questions!