Medical home 2.0 has been saved
The goal of the patient-centered medical home (PCMH) is to deliver continuous, accessible, high-quality, patient-oriented primary care—coordinated by a primary care physician, supported by information technologies, and delivered by a multi-disciplinary team of allied health professionals. The Deloitte Center for Health Solutions’ second such report outlines the current state of the PCMH under new federal health reform legislation, reviews primary results from several pilots programs and discusses how PCMHs may evolve going forward.
The patient-centered medical home (PCMH) is a way of organizing primary care so that patients receive care that is coordinated by a primary care physician (PCP), supported by information technologies for self-care management, delivered by a multi-disciplinary team of allied health professionals, and adherent to evidence-based practice guidelines. The goal of the PCMH is to deliver continuous, accessible, high-quality, patient-oriented primary care.
The American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) introduced the medical home concept in 1967; more recently (2006), it was used in pilot programs for Medicare enrollees. PCMH’s potential to improve population-based outcomes and reduce long-term health care costs has its underpinning in the 2010 Patient Protection and Affordable Health Care Act (PPACA), under which new pilot programs are funded.
Our previous report1 examined medical home models, their savings potential, and the implications for policy makers and key industry stakeholders. In this report, we outline the current state of the PCMH under new federal health reform legislation, review primary results from several pilots programs, and discuss how PCMHs may evolve going forward.
The PCMH is an innovative model of primary care delivery that espouses the coordination of care as a necessary replacement for volume-based incentives that limit PCP effectiveness. It is widely touted by the American Academy of Family Physicians (AAFP), AAP, the American Osteopathic Association (AOA) and the American College of Physicians (ACP) as a means of reducing long-term health care costs associated with chronic diseases.2
In 2007, these four societies released the Joint Principles of the Patient-Centered Medical Home, which are summarized in Figure 1.
Figure 1: Summary of joint principles of the patient-centered medical home
Principle | Description |
Personal physician | Patients are assigned to a personal physician who provides “first contact, continuous and comprehensive care” |
Physician-directed medical practice | Personal physician leads all other health care providers in the patient’s care |
“Whole person” orientation | Personal physician is responsible for all of the patient’s care, including acute, chronic, preventive and end-of-life care |
Integrated and coordinated care | Care is coordinated across all facilities through health care technology |
Quality and safety | Practice collaborates with patient and family to define a patient-centered care plan |
Practice uses evidence-based medicine and care pathways | |
Practice performs continuous quality improvement by measuring and reporting performance metrics | |
Patient feedback is incorporated into performance measurement | |
Patients and families participate in practice quality improvement | |
Information technology is a foundation of patient care, performance measurement, communication and patient education | |
Practices are certified as patient-centered by non-governmental entities | |
Physicians share in savings from reduced hospitalizations | |
Physicians receive bonus payments for attaining predetermined quality metrics | |
Enhanced access to care | Patients can take advantage of open scheduling, expanded hours and new communication options with the physician practice |
Payments that recognize primary care added value | Payments should reflect both physician and non-physician value and encompass payments for all services, including non-face-to-face visits and care management |
The “patient-centered medical home” is referenced 19 times in PPACA3 in the context of five major initiatives, which are detailed in Figure 2.4
Figure 2: PCMH references in the PPACA
PCMH Initiative | Description |
Innovation Center | The Center for Medicare and Medicaid Innovation will be testing and evaluating models that include medical homes as a way of addressing defined populations with either: (1) poor clinical outcomes or (2) avoidable expenditures. |
Health Plan Performance | Medical homes are identified as one performance indicator for health plans. Additionally, the state health insurance exchanges are designing incentives to encourage high-performance plans, including those with medical homes. |
Chronic Medicaid Enrollee Care | Starting in 2011, the federal government will match state funds up to 90 percent for two years to those states that provide options for Medicaid enrollees with chronic conditions to receive their care under a medical home model. |
Community Care | To encourage the establishment of medical homes in community health systems, PPACA is providing grants to community care teams that organize themselves under the medical home model. |
New Model for Training | In conjunction with the Agency for Health Research & Quality (AHRQ), PPACA creates the Primary Care Extension Program, which provides primary care training and implementation of medical home quality improvement and processes. |
While trade and peer-reviewed literature references more than 100 planned or established PCMH pilot programs, results reporting (e.g., cost savings, population health improvements) is scarce. The referenced programs (a few of which are listed in Figure 3) vary widely in structural characteristics, scope of patient enrollment, disease mix, operating models, and sponsorship.
Figure 3: Pilot medical home programs in the U.S.
Program | State | Start | # Physicians |
TransforMED National Demonstration Project: 36 family practices | Multiple | 2006 | TBD |
Guided Care | MD | 2006 | 49 |
Greater New Orleans Primary Care Access and Stabilization Grant | LA | 2007 | 324 |
Louisiana Health Care Quality Forum Medical Home Initiative | LA | 2007 | 500 |
Colorado Family Medicine Residency PCMH Project | CO | 2008 | 320 |
Metcare of Florida/Humana Patient-Centered Medical Home | FL | 2008 | 17 |
National Naval Medical Center Medical Home Program | MD | 2008 | 25 |
Blue Cross Blue Shield of Michigan: Patient-Centered Medical Home Program | MI | 2008 | 8,147 |
Priority Health PCMH Grant Program | MI | 2008 | 108 |
CIGNA and Dartmouth-Hitchcock Patient-Centered Medical Home Pilot | NH | 2008 | 253 |
EmblemHealth Medical Home High Value Network Project | NY | 2008 | 159 |
CDPHP Patient-centered Medical Home Pilot | NY | 2008 | 18 |
Hudson Valley P4P-Medical Home Project | NY | 2008 | 500 |
Queen City Physicians/Humana Patient-Centered Medical Home | OH | 2008 | 18 |
TriHealth Physician Practices/Humana Patient-Centered Medical Home | OH | 2008 | 8 |
OU School of Community Medicine: Patient-Centered Medical Home Project | OH | 2008 | TBD |
Pennsylvania Chronic Care Initiative | PA | 2008 | 780 |
Rhode Island Chronic Care Sustainability Initiative | RI | 2008 | 28 |
Vermont Blueprint Integrated Pilot Program | VT | 2008 | 44 |
Alabama Health Improvement Initiative–Medical Home Pilot | AL | 2009 | 70 |
UnitedHealth Group PCMH Demonstration Program | AZ | 2009 | 25 |
The Colorado Multi-Payer, Multi-State Patient-Centered Medical Home Pilot | CO | 2009 | 51 |
CareFirst BlueCross BlueShield Patient-Centered Medical Home Demonstration Program | MD | 2009 | 84 |
Maine Patient-Centered Medical Home Pilot | ME | 2009 | 221 |
I3 PCMH Academic Collaborative | NC | 2009 | 753 |
NH Multi-Stakeholder Medical Home Pilot | NH | 2009 | 63 |
NJ Academy of Family Physicians/Horizon Blue Cross Blue Shield of NJ | NJ | 2009 | 165 |
Greater Cincinnati Aligning Forces for Quality Medical Home Pilot | OH | 2009 | 35 |
I3 PCMH Academic Collaborative | SC | 2009 | 753 |
Washington Patient-Centered Medical Home Collaborative | WA | 2009 | 755 |
West Virginia Medical Home Pilot | WV | 2009 | 50 |
CIGNA/Piedmont Physician Group Collaborative Accountable Patient-centered Medical Home | GA | 2010 | 93 |
WellStar Health System/Humana Patient-Centered Medical Home | GA | 2010 | 12 |
CIGNA/Eastern Maine Health Systems | ME | 2010 | 30 |
NJ FQHC Medical Home Pilot | NJ | 2010 | 17 |
Dfcic PCMH Pilot | OR | 2010 | 1 |
Texas Medical Home Initiative | TX | 2010 | 30 |
Medicare-Medicaid Advanced Primary Care Demonstration Initiative | Up to 6 states | 2011 | TBD |
Of the few substantive, academically rigorous studies conducted on PCMHs, three of the more robust are summarized below:
Study #1—Researchers at Harvard Medical School, Brigham and Women’s Hospital, and the Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center identified 26 ongoing PCMH pilots,6 encompassing 14,494 physicians in 4,707 practices and five million patients. The team’s analysis spotlighted the highly variable structural, financial, and operational features of these PCMHs (Figure 4). In addition, the team observed that PCMHs employ one of two basic practice models: (1) a collaborative learning chronic care management model or (2) an external consultant-facilitated model.
Figure 4: Variability of 26 ongoing PCMH pilots7
Approach | Characteristic | Frequency* |
Transformation Model | ConsultativeChronic care model-based learning collaborativeCombinationNone | 35%23%15%27% |
Use of Facilitator | InternalExternalNone | 27%42%31% |
Focus of Improvement | GeneralDisease-specific | 46%54% |
Information Technology* | EMRRegistryNeither are required nor encouraged | 69%81%8% |
Payment Model* | Single payorMulti-payors that have Safe HarborsUse FFS Payments-Typical FFS Payments-Enhanced FFS PaymentsUse some form of per-person, per-month payments (PPPM)Incorporate bonus payments (Either existing P4P programs or new programs) | 69%44%100%96%4%96%77% |
Study #2—A 2010 study led by researchers at Harvard Medical School analyzed seven medical home programs (Figure 5) to assess the features of those deemed successful.8 Sponsors of these programs included prominent commercial health plans, integrated health systems, and government-sponsored programs: Colorado Medical Homes for Children, Community Care of North Carolina, Geisinger Health System, Group Health Cooperative, Intermountain Health Care, MeritCare Health System and Blue Cross Blue Shield of North Dakota, and Vermont’s Blueprint for Health. The selected programs were measured on improvements in the number of hospitalizations and savings per patient.
Figure 5: Analysis of seven PCMH pilot programs9
Pilot | # of Patients | Population | Incentives | Results (Hospital reduction %) | Results (ER visit reduction %) | Results (Total savings per patient) |
Colorado MedicalHomes for Children | 10,781 | Medicaid CHP+ | Pay for Performance (P4P) | 18% | NA | $169-530 |
Community Care ofNorth Carolina | > 1 million | Medicaid | Par member Per Month (PMPM)payment | 40% | 16% | $516 |
Geisinger(ProvenHealthNavigator) | TBD | Medicare Advantage | P4P, PMPM payment; sharedsavings | 15% | NA | NA |
Group HealthCooperative | 9,200 | All | TBD | 11% | 29% | $71 |
Intermountain Health Care (Care Management Plus) | 4,700 | Chronic disease | P4P | 4.8-19.2% | 0-7.3% | $640 |
MeritCare Health System and Blue Cross Blue Shield of North Dakota | 192 | Diabetes | PMPMpayment; sharedsavings | 6% | 24% | $530 |
Vermont BluePrintfor Health | 60,000 | All | PMPMpayment | 11% | 12% | $215 |
Despite the sample’s heterogeneity, the research team concluded that four common features were salient to the seven programs’ success:10
Study #3—The National Demonstration Project (NDP) published its preliminary results in 2010 after examining medical home programs between 2006 and 2008. Designed by TransforMED, a subsidiary of the AAFP, the project was the first systematic test of PMCH effectiveness across 36 family practices in several states.11 The research team concluded that the PCMH model is potentially effective in reducing costs and improving health status but requires significant investment and operating competencies that might be problematic for traditional practitioners.12,13,14 Among the study’s major takeaways:
The scarcity of academic and trade industry research on PCMHs is problematic. Similarly, the fact that half of the PCMH pilots to date identified metrics for calculating results a priori is troublesome.15 Fortunately, credible organizations are making strides to bridge the gap in the quest for valid and reliable PCMH metrics. For example, the National Committee for Quality Assurance (NCQA) issued scoring guidelines that are widely used by pilot programs.16 Its Physician Practice Connections—Patient-Centered Medical Home (PPC-PCMH), shown in Figure 6, provides nine “must pass” standards, scored on a scale of up to 100 points, with three levels of recognition.17
Other notable measurement efforts include the Primary Care Assessment Survey,18 the Primary Care Assessment Tool,19 the Components of Primary Care Instrument,20 the Patient Enablement Instrument, the Consultation and Relational Empathy measure, the Consultation Quality Index, and the Medical Home Intelligence Quotient.21,22
The medical home model’s clinical and economic potential is promising; however, the precise features of an optimally successful program are somewhat elusive. Our findings:
Credible organizations are making strides to bridge the gap in the quest for valid and reliable PCMH metrics.
These elements seem to form a reasonable foundation for payment transformation in primary care. However, one issue could impact the third element: the validity and reliability of metrics used to define “quality” and “efficiency” and the timeframe (in months or years, depending on the patient population) in which they’re captured. As these metrics evolve, the relationships between medical homes and specialty practices will necessarily need refinement; also, metrics will need to be developed that reward appropriate inclusion of specialty medicine in targeted patient populations.
Figure 6: PPC-PCMH content and scoring correlated to seven “Joint Principles”26
Core Principles of the Patient-Centered Medical Home Covered in the Tool | |||||
PPC-PCMH Domain | Physician- directed Practice | Whole-person Orientation | Care Coordinated or Integrated | Quality and Safety | Enhanced Access |
Access and Communication | Setting and measuringaccess standards (9 pts) | ||||
Patient Tracking and Registry Functions | Clinical data systems, paper or electronic charting tools to organize clinical information (14 pts) | Registries for population management and identification of main conditions in practice (7 pts) | |||
Care Management | Use of non-physician staff to manage care (3 pts) | Caremanagement (5 pts) | Coordinating care and follow-up (5 pts) | Implementingevidence-based guidelines for three conditions and generating preventive service reminders for clinicians (7 pts) | |
Patient Self-management Support | Supportingself-management (4 pts) | Assessment of communication barriers (2 pts) | |||
Electronic Prescribing | E-prescribing and cost and safety check functions (8 pts) | ||||
Test Tracking | Electronic systems to order, retrieve and track tests (13 pts) | ||||
Referral tracking | Automated system (4 pts) | ||||
Performance Reporting and Improvement | Performance measurement and reporting, quality improvement and seeking patient feedback (15 pts) | ||||
Advanced Electronic Communications | E-communicationwith DM orCM managers(1 pt) | E-communication toidentify patients duefor care (2 pts) | Interactive website thatfacilitatesaccess (1 pt) | ||
Total | 3 pts | 9 pts | 20 pts | 56 pts | 12 pts |
Adapted from Landon BE, Gill JM, Antonelli RC, and Rich EC. “Prospects For Rebuilding Primary Care Using The Patient-Centered Medical Home,”
Health Affairs, May 2010; 29(5): 827-834.
The medical home of the future will likely be a refinement of the assorted pilots and programs currently under way. We remain supportive and optimistic about its potential, as well as realistic that answers to its challenges will not be quickly available.
Medical home 2.0 is an innovation whose time has come. The confluence of rising health costs, an aging and less healthy population, payment reforms shifting volume to performance, and increased access to clinical information technologies that enhance coordination and connectivity between care teams and consumers suggests that the medical home will likely be a permanent, near-term fixture on the U.S. health care landscape.