There is a copy of a Thich Nhat Hanh book in her exam room. I imagine it as an amulet, or maybe a mantra, quietly working on her behalf: “I am a continuation, like the rain is a continuation of the cloud.” She cannot be anything less, anything more. In fifteen minutes, she is expected to earn […]
A new Pediatric Collaborative Pathway has been developed to solve this problem, offering a structured, feedback-driven system that turns chaos into clarity. Here are four practical ways to implement this pathway in your practice today. 1. Make Screening Meaningful Screening shouldn’t just be a compliance task; it is the foundation of clinical decision-making. The pathway […]
Collaborative documentation is far more than a technique for writing notes. When used intentionally, it becomes a foundation for partnership‑based care and serves multiple meaningful functions that shape the clinical encounter itself. The Functions of Collaborative Documentation A Process and an Outcome Collaborative documentation turns the note into both a shared activity and a tangible […]
For these practices, an Integrated Psychiatry approach—directly informed by the Primary Care Behavioral Health (PCBH) model—provides a flexible, population‑focused alternative. PCBH emphasizes rapid access, same‑day consultation, brief interventions, and team‑based care embedded directly within primary care workflows. Applying these principles, Integrated Psychiatry brings psychiatric expertise into the pediatric medical home, enhancing access, reducing stigma, strengthening […]
Marcus is a 40‑year‑old African American man whose primary care provider (PCP) recently noted significant changes in mood following his ALS diagnosis two months ago. During several follow‑up appointments, the PCP observed that Marcus appeared less engaged, showed diminished interest in life, and expressed overwhelming concern about what the progression of the disease might mean […]
Nearly every time we work with consulting clients working on implementing integrated care the complaint is the same. There’s a healthcare administrator breathing down their neck about how many scheduling slots are going unutilized. It’s as if the golden hammer of healthcare optimization is managing slots. It’s time we call this what it is – […]
By Neftali Serrano, PsyD Far too often, I hear the same weary refrain from healthcare professionals championing integrated care: “My leaders tell me that my integrated care program is just not making us enough money.” Let’s be clear—this isn’t a financial question. It’s a philosophical one dressed up in a spreadsheet. Because when a leadership […]
Maria, RN By three in the afternoon, the clinic always felt a little frayed at the edges. The hum of printers, the faint ring of unanswered phone lines, the blinking of notices for new results — it all blended into the kind of background noise you stop noticing until the day feels heavy. It was […]
Why We Need Dedicated Integrated Care Directors — At Every Level of the Health System If you’ve spent any time in the integrated care space, you know the pattern: A grant funds a pilot. A bold health plan tries something innovative. A state rolls out a value-based model. Then people move on, funding dries up, […]
The Firestarter Framework: Fueling Passion and Purpose Dr. Thomas opened her session delving into the Firestarter Framework to explore our personal journeys in Integrated Care leadership and inspire participants to carry the CFHA “spark” home after the conference, igniting ongoing passion for integration. This framework classifies drivers of change into three groups. These Firestarter types […]
What’s New in the MOUD Playbook The updated Playbook offers several key enhancements: · A stronger emphasis on low-barrier, person-centered care. The Playbook underscores that using MOUD saves lives and should not be withheld due to continued substance use or resistance to counseling. It highlights the need for stigma reduction, appropriate levels of care, and […]
Bion’s Relevance in Modern Healthcare The psychoanalytic perspectives of Bion, especially his concepts of container-contained thinking, thinking under pressure, and emotional truth, appear conceptually distant from the practical and fast-paced demands of integrated healthcare. Yet it is precisely in this setting, where clinicians must think quickly while holding complex emotions, that Bion becomes indispensable. According […]
The Value of a Pearls Gathering At the end of the first pandemic year, BHCs from multiple sites at the Pediatric Physicians’ Organization at Children’s (PPOC) convened to reflect on what we called the “Pearls of 2020 – Staying Integrated During the Pandemic.” The Pearls initiative identified six key elements of integration, each of which […]
Third Culture Kids (TCKs) are children of expatriates who spend a significant part of their upbringing in a culture different from their own or their parents’ nationality. The term TCK stems from the presence of three cultural influences in their lives: their heritage culture(s), the host country culture(s), and the culture of expatriates and other TCKs. […]
Interestingly the word “Jenga” does not mean “angst derived from a predestinated tower of calamity.” Jenga’s roots are in Swahili from the word “kujenga” meaning “to build” (“Jenga”, 2025). Jenga got me thinking about integrated care on one of these fun Saturday nights. We take the warm handoff on the behavioral health side (or provide […]
Dear Mr. Kennedy, First, thank you for bringing urgency and passion to the nation’s conversation on health and the chronic disease epidemic. Your desire to reimagine our approach to well-being is one that we share as a 30-year-old upstart association rooted in the fundamental idea that our health system is disintegrated. At the Collaborative Family […]
One other thing that made this meeting memorable was the appearance of T-shirts that express loyalty to a model of integrated care. It started with the PCBH T-shirts, but by the end of the conference I was seeing CoCM T-shirts as well. This made literal the process that I have been thinking about for several […]
Howard Thurman, a spiritual founder of the civil rights movement once wrote, “Don’t ask what the world needs. Ask what makes you come alive, and go do it. Because what the world needs is people who have come alive.” His words challenge us to resist stagnation, conformity, and systems that stifle our ability to effect meaningful change. […]
