You and the Patient-Centered Medical Home: What is it? How does it affect you?
These are open Putney community sessions focusing on how health care reform in Vermont is affecting the way in which health care services are organized and delivered. Come learn about how the Vermont Blueprint for Health, the statewide initiative designed to improve the health of Vermonters, is using a model for health care delivery called the “Patient-Centered Medical Home”, or “PCMH” for short to enhance the way your health care is managed.
Learn what a PCMH is and what your rights are as a patient receiving care in a PCMH. Both medical offices in Putney, HeartSong Health in Community and Putney Family Health Care, are now certified PCMHs, all of the BMH medical practices either have become certified as PCMHs or are in the process of becoming certified. If you receive care in Putney, you are now part of a PCMH. If you receive care in a BMH practice in Brattleboro, you are, or will soon be, part of a PCMH. Make sure that you know what this means for you and your family.
When: Two January dates have been scheduled:
Wednesday, January 15th at 6:30 p.m., with a reprise on Sunday January 19th at 4:00 p.m. for people who aren’t able to attend the Wednesday meeting.
Where: Both sessions will be held at the Putney Fire Station on Main Street/Route 5 in Putney.
Who: These sessions will be presented by Dr. Ani Hawkinson, the Executive Director of HeartSong Health In Community, Putney, the only nonprofit Vermont Blueprint for Health-certified Level III naturopathic patient-centered medical home in America. Having overseen HeartSong’s PCMH certification from beginning to end, Dr. Ani is extremely well-informed about the intentions and the realities of the PCMH certification process in Vermont. As founder of the only naturopathic nonprofit medical clinic in the U.S., she is extremely committed to health care advocacy and making sure that everyone is well-informed about what the PCMH model of health care promises its users.
Patient-Centered Medical Home
It is important for all of us to understand the system which “delivers” our medical care. And knowing Dr. Ani, I am sure that her talk will be informative, and worthwhile.
But for every person who is able to attend one of these presentations in Putney, there will be many many more of us who do not attend. It would be really helpful if Dr. Ani (or someone else) could post a link to a site which explains what this PCMH is all about.