Integrated Primary Care:
The Central Piece in the Healthcare Puzzle
Illustration by Mona Caron
Integrated Primary Care combines medical and
behavioral health services to more fully address the spectrum of problems
that patients bring to primary medical care. Because the vast majority of patients in primary
care have either a physical ailment that is affected by stress, problems
maintaining healthy lifestyles or a psychological disorder, it is clinically effective and
cost effective to make behavioral health providers part of primary medical
care. IPC allows patients to feel that for any problem they bring,
they have come to the right place. By teaming mental health and medical
providers, IPC is the structural realization of the biopsychosocial model
advocated so broadly in Family Medicine and Psychiatry.
It is the reunification in practice of the mind and the body, for so long
addressed in the separate worlds of medical and mental health treatment.
- What IPC is like in practice? Many programs start with Care Management for depression.
- Books, Free Reports, and Web Resources
- Clinical Effectiveness , Cost Effectiveness and ways of Funding IPC.
- Low income and underserved populations
- Children's behavioral health needs in primary care
- Behavioral Health in the Patient Centered Medical Home
The best training program to prepare mental health
professionals to practice in primary care is presented by
The best conference to learn about the latest in integrated care, clinically, administratively and financially is the annual conference of the Collaborative Family Healthcare Association. Louisville, KY, October 21-23, 2010. Go to www.CFHA.net . View a FILM about the conference.
Recent additions (2/2/10) and new links of interest include:
New information on the Patient Centered Medical Home
The Chair of the Board of the American Academy of Family Physicians wants to promote integrated primary care.
Consultation for practices instituting Integrated Primary Care
This page is maintained by Integrated Primary Care, Inc. It is meant to reflect the evolving state of Integrated Primary Care nationally.