Patient-centered Medical Home

The patient-centered medical home is an approach to providing comprehensive primary care for people of all ages and medical conditions. In a patient-centered medical home, the patient is an active participant in his/her own health and is cared for by a family physician who leads the practice team coordinating all aspects of the patient’s health.

To succeed, the medical home requires reform of the payment system. A blended model of payment paid directly to each patient’s designated medical home would enable family physicians to redesign their offices to deliver high-quality preventive and chronic care with improved outcomes for Medicare beneficiaries.

The federal government is the largest payer for health care. As a result, the AAFP supports Congressional actions to bring the features of the patient-centered medical home to beneficiaries of federally supported health care programs, such as Medicare, Medicaid, TRICARE and the Federal Employees Health Benefits Program.