National Meeting on Increasing Investment in Primary Care

FMAHealth in collaboration with the Patient Centered Primary Care Collaborative (PCPCC) sponsored, the first national conversation on increasing investment in primary care on November 9, 2018. The workshop followed the PCPCC’s Annual Conference where a broad audience was educated about the importance of increased investment in primary care. Alex Azar, Secretary of Health and Human Services, spoke about the importance of primary care and ways in which CMMI would be moving forward with alternative primary care payment models.

Twenty-five states were represented at the workshop. Participants heard from Oregon, Rhode Island, Colorado and Delaware about their work to raise investment in primary care to 12% or more of their states’ healthcare budgets in order to achieve the kind of care envisioned by the Shared Principles of Primary Care. Increased investment in primary care could support care coordination, technologies like telehealth, mental and behavioral health integration, medication management and population health, including better integration with community health workers.