Offering Patients a Medical Home – Not a Hallway – and a Stronger Health System

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Healthcare Quarterly 22(3) October 2019

 

Abstract

This article examines three family health teams (FHTs) in different Ontario communities that exemplify the features of a Patient's Medical Home (PMH), a vision developed by the College of Family Physicians of Canada. With PMH supports and foundations in place, these FHTs deliver high-quality care enabled by strong PMH functions: accessible, comprehensive, patient- and family-centred continuous care that is responsive to a community's unique needs. Adhering to PMH principles not only improves patient experience, health outcomes and provider satisfaction but also leads to fewer unnecessary hospital admissions and emergency room visits – system savings and better use of public resources.

Featured FHTs:

  • Marathon FHT's High-Yield Approach to Risk Mitigation and Safety (HARMS): A program for safer opioid prescribing through systematic risk stratification and urine drug testing

  • Markham FHT's Eating Disorders Bridge Program

  • Peterborough FHT: New services improve primary care access to an underserviced region

Authors

  • Leanne Clarke, CEO, Ontario College of Family Physicians
  • Kavita Mehta, CEO, Association of Family Health Teams of Ontario.

 

Mental Health and Addiction QI Collaborative Webinar Series - Part 2

Tue, January 14, 2020
Zoom Webinar

Join CMHA, AMHO, and AFHTO for a 2ND of a 4-part webinar series on community and primary care QI projects and initiatives with a focus on mental health and addiction.

In preparation for Ontario Health Teams, learn about opportunities for collaboration with your local mental health and addiction agencies and how to implement quality improvement initiatives.

Presenters:

The Digital Health Toolbox: Enabling High-Performance Teams in The Delivery of Integrated, Patient-Centred Care Webinar

Thu, November 28, 2019
Webinar

The current healthcare landscape poses pressure to modernize health care delivery, striving for an integrated, higher-quality patient-centred model. Digital health tools, when designed, deployed and maintained to meet user needs, play an important role in enhancing patient and provider experience, and unlocking opportunities for a greater understanding of patient population and the delivery of proactive care, while optimizing the use of resources.

Care plans reduce risk of ending up in hospital for patients with severe mental illness: study

The chances of a patient with a serious mental illness ending up in hospital because of their condition are reduced by almost 40 per cent if they have a care plan, according to the research.

The study, which tracked 20,000 patients with a severe mental illness through the healthcare system, also found that seeing the same GP reduced the risk of an unplanned hospital admission by around 25 per cent.

Tags
Mental Health Care
evidence of value

Innovation in Ontario's Family Health Teams: How Palliative and Coordinated Care Programs are Filling Service Gaps and Keeping Patients at Home

Innovation in Ontario's Family Health Teams: How Palliative and Coordinated Care Programs are Filling Service Gaps and Keeping Patients at Home 

Article published in Healthcare Quarterly Today on June 25, 2019

Tags
Care for Specific Populations
evidence of value
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