Beacon Program provides a pediatric medical home for children with medical complexity
Program's goals include simplifying the process of managing care and reducing patient visits and inpatient admissions
Marcus is a happy little boy. But at age 2, he faces challenges. Marcus was born with a very rare genetic defect that infected his heart.
The Beacon Clinic is nationally recognized as a patient centered medical home. Its team streamlines the health care process for parents with at least one child with medical complexity. That means Marcus and his older brother can both be seen here.
"When you meet these families, they are going through so much, and they have so many different responsibilities. And so, sort of our role in Beacon with our team based model is to help alleviate some of those burdens and help provide care and guidance and even sometimes just being an ear to listen" said Ingrid Larson, Beacon Program Director.
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More information about Children's Mercy's Beacon Program:
- Our program is designed to maximize health outcomes for the more than 275 patients we serve. We create custom care plans for each patient.
- Patients are able to avoid unnecessary emergency department visits and inpatient admissions because of access of 24/7 access to a primary care provider who is a member of the Beacon team.
- Families experience greater satisfaction with the health care system because our team works with all specialists involved in the patient’s care and community providers.
- Our program includes care for the primary patient and their siblings (those with mild complexities and those who require routine pediatric care.) This offers families one medical home for multiple children.
- Amber Hoffman, M.D., and Ingrid Larson, MBA, M.S.N., APRN, CPNP lead the Beacon Program. Read the article from the Children’s Hospital Association about how the program is developing develop new care delivery models for rural children with complex medical conditions.
- The Beacon Program has achieved the highest level of recognition possible from the National Committee for Quality Assurance as a patient-centered medical home. To achieve level III recognition, the Beacon Clinic met or exceeded rigorous patient-centered medical home standards for addressing patient needs. Only 10 percent of all primary care practices nationwide have earned this recognition.