The Oregon Medical Home Project is one of 15 three year grants funded in 2001-2002 by the Maternal & Child Health Bureau (MCHB), United States HRSA. The projects were funded to facilitate the development of medical homes throughout each state. The goal of our project is to promote the concept of the medical home by creating a statewide network of parent and professional resource teams.

The objectives of the Oregon Medical Home Project are as follows:

* Establish resource teams in six communities in different regions of Oregon
* Expand access to medical home training to professionals in local communities
* Provide support and guidance on the process of continuous quality improvement to individual practices
* Provide tools to assist practices to identify CSHN
* Promote the integration of services in local communities
* Ensure ongoing fiscal and agency support for the parent-professional Resource Teams and other care coordination activities in the primary care office.

Identification of the Medical Home Resource Teams: Six primary care practices who have demonstrated an interest in working in partnership with families of children with special needs and community providers were chosen to begin the process of expanding the concept of medical home throughout Oregon. Most of these pediatricians also are working in CDRC's Community Connections Network. Two parents from each practice, a nurse from CDRC's CaCoon (Care Coordination) program and the pediatrician make up the Resource Team. The CaCoon nurses and parents work closely with the pediatrician and office staff to enhance resource identification and referral services and to build a process of continuous quality improvement in the office based on the model developed by the Rural Medical Home Improvement Project (Cooley and McAllister, 2001). In the future, each Resource Team will support other practices in their community in developing resource and referral materials and quality improvement teams.

The pediatric practices who are partners in the Oregon Medical Home Project are:

* Childhood Associates of Salem
* Central Oregon Pediatric Association of Bend
* Treasure Valley Pediatrics of Ontario
* Mid Valley Children's Clinic of Albany
* Southern Oregon Pediatrics of Medford
* OHSU Family Medicine at Gabriel Park of Portland

Medical Home Staff

Robert Nickel, MD, Project Director
rnickel@uoregon.edu

Pat Tangeman, MA, MEd, PT, Project Coordinator
tangeman@ohsu.edu

Denise Whitworth, Support Staff
denisew@uoregon.edu