The Maternal and Child Health Bureau (MCHB) is offering this grant to establish a National Center for Medical Home Implementation for Children with Special Health Care Needs.

The purpose of this activity is to: 1) support a national resource and technical assistance effort to implement and spread the medical home model to all children and youth, particularly children with special health care needs (CSHCN), children who are vulnerable and/or medically underserved, and pediatric populations served by state public health programs, MCHB and HRSA;  and 2) support activities of the Healthy Tomorrows Partnership for Children Program (HTPCP) grantees to improve children’s health through innovative community-based efforts, and community and statewide partnerships among professionals in health, education, social services, government, and business.

It is anticipated the national center will:

Conduct activities to increase access and awareness of the medical home model and policy initiatives related to achieving medical homes for children and youth, particularly children and youth with special health care needs (CYSHCN) and children/youth who are vulnerable and/or medically underserved;

Promote and support communities and states in their efforts to spread and sustain the medical home model for children, particularly for CYSHCN and children/youth who are vulnerable and/or medically underserved, by forming partnerships and utilizing quality improvement strategies such as learning collaboratives and improvement partnerships;

Promote and support activities that encourage health care professionals, including safety net providers, to coordinate their efforts across and between professionals in a team-based integrated approach that seeks to coordinate the continuum of services including health, education, social service, public health to provide comprehensive and coordinated care for the children and youth they serve;

Promote problem solving at the community level by encouraging pediatric clinicians’ participation; and public-private partnership, such as the Early Childhood Comprehensive Systems Initiative, Project Launch, and private sector support for improved collaboration and coordination of and access to mental, oral, and physical health and non-clinical resources (e.g. home visiting, early care and education settings such as child care and Head Start, early intervention, child welfare, education) at the community level for children, youth, and their families;

Identify and share tested strategies and models for facilitating family-professional partnerships and family-centered care at the practice, organization, and system levels;

Provide pediatric clinicians with the tools, e.g. Building Your Medical Home Toolkit, and knowledge, particularly in areas related to communication, care coordination, cultural competence, use of standardized guidelines, and performance reporting to improve care delivery utilizing the medical home model (for additional resources visit: http://www.medicalhomeinfo.org/;

Support activities that expand and enhance pediatric clinicians’ capacity to collect, analyze, and use quantitative and qualitative data to generate evidence for the continual support of the medical home model of care for CSHCN, and identify critical factors that result in sustainability and effectiveness of primary care and community-based projects;

 Monitor and evaluate the national center’s activities and results.

In addition, the national center will:

Provide consultation to HTPCP program participants, monitor and assess outcomes,  and disseminate information on effective strategies to ensure successful implementation, evaluation, quality improvement, and sustainability of community-based initiatives, utilizing methods, including webinars, prospective topical communities of practice, and web site;
Identify obstacles (issues and contributing factors) to provider participation in the delivery of maternal and child health services to medically underserved, socially and economically disadvantaged pregnant women, children and youth, as well as involvement in problem-solving at the community level; and
Promote community training for pediatric residents, medical students and graduate-level  students in clinical and public-health related MCH training programs with an interest in providing care, developing policy, or advancing advocacy within a medical home or community-based setting.  Disseminate effective approaches to implement community training initiatives.