Welcome to Your Medical Home

When it comes to your child’s health care, whether you are seeking wellness, recovering from illness or managing a chronic condition. It is a cycle of staying well, getting well, and being well. If your desire is to deal with these health situations in a long-term relationships with a trusted pediatrician, then you’ve found your Patient-Centered Medical Home at Georgetown Pediatrics.

Think about it. Your pediatrician and an extended team of health professionals build a relationship in which they know your child, your family situation, your child’s medical history and health issues. In turn, you come to trust and rely on them for expert, evidence-based health care answers that are suited entirely to your child or to your family.

A Medical Home is all about your child

Caring about your child is the most important job of Georgetown Pediatrics. In this personal model of health care, your pediatrician leads the team of health care professionals that collectively take responsibility for your child’s care. They make sure you get the care your child needs in wellness and illness, for the health your child’s body, mind and spirit.

The Medical Home Advantage

There are many benefits to being in a Medical Home:

• Comprehensive care means your medical home helps you address any health issue at any given stage of your child’s life from infancy through late adolescence
• Coordination of care occurs when any combination of services you and your provider decide your child needs are connected and ordered in a rational way, including the use of resources in your community
• Continuous care occurs over time and you can expect continuity in accurate, effective and timely communication from any member of your child’s health care team
• Accessible care allows you to initiate the interaction you need for any health issue with a pediatrician or other team member and you can expect elimination of barriers to the access of care and instructions on obtaining care during and after hours
• Proactive care ensures you and your child’s pediatrician will build a care plan to address your child’s health care goals to keep them well, plus be available for you when your child gets sick.

Who is your Medical Home team?

Your team includes your child’s pediatrician, other pediatricians of Georgetown Pediatrics and the nurses and secretaries who work at Georgetown Pediatrics. These professionals work together to help your child get healthy, stay healthy, and get the care and services that are right for them. When needed, your pediatrician arranges for appropriate care with qualified specialists.

We want to learn about your child

• We want to get to know your child, your family, your life situation, and preferences, and suggest treatments that make sense for you.
• We want to treat you as a full partner in your child’s care
• We want to communicate effectively with you
• We want to give you time to ask questions and we want to answer them in a way you understand
• We want to make sure you know and understand all of your options for care of your child
• We want to help you decide what care is best for your child. Sometimes more care is not better care. We want to ask you for feedback about your care experience.

We want to support you in caring for your child

• We want to make sure you develop a clear idea of how to care for your child.
• We want to help you set goals for your child’s care and help you meet your goals one step at a time
• We want to give you information about classes, support groups, or other types of services to help you learn more about your child’s condition and help them stay healthy
• We want to encourage you to fully participate in recommended preventive screenings and services for your child

Here is what you can do

Actively participate in your child’s care

You are the most important member of the medical home team.

• Understand that you are a full partner in your child’s health care
• Learn about your child’s condition and what you can do to help them stay as healthy as possible
• As best you can, follow the care plan that you and your medical team have agreed is important for your child’s health

Communicate with your child’s Medical Home team

• Bring a list of questions to each appointment. Also, bring a list of any medicines, vitamins, or remedies you use
• If you don’t understand something your pediatrician or other member of your medical home team says, ask them to explain it in a different way
• If your child gets care from other health professionals, always tell your medical home team so they can help coordinate for the best care possible
• Talk openly with your care team about your experience in getting care from the medical home so they can keep making your child’s care better.

Patient Centered Medical Home (Adobe PDF)