Primary Care Services

A consumer-obsessed strategy is key to rebuilding primary care

March 28, 2024 - While healthcare consumerism has reshaped the way patients engage and feel empowered in their care, for many health systems, it’s had the opposite effect, fragmenting patient care access and threatening the continuity of primary care into high-acuity settings—not to mention organizational bottom lines. Consumerism in healthcare has heralded a new era in which patients are...


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How Family Physicians Can Solve US Maternal Health Problems

by Sara Heath

It’s not a secret that healthcare is staring down a maternal mortality problem. But what might be less known is the critical role family physicians can play in ameliorating it. “This country has a lot of work to do on...

How a Primary Care-Based Housing Instability Program Cut Outpatient Utilization

by Sara Heath

A community health worker-led program to address housing instability was effective at reducing primary care and outpatient care overutilization, proving that addressing the social determinant of health...

Patient-Provider Communication About Dementia Left Wanting

by Sara Heath

Social stigma is getting in the way of patient-provider communication about Alzheimer’s and other dementias, but there’s a way around that, according to researchers from the Regenstrief...

Preventable Hospitalizations More Common for Black Patients

by Sara Heath

Black Medicaid enrollees are more likely to experience a preventable hospitalization than their White counterparts, according to a new report, a trend that researchers at the Urban Institute said...

More Patients Visit NPs & PAs as Usual Source of Care, Primary Care

by Sara Heath

The landscape for people’s usual source of care is changing, with fewer people reporting a regular primary care provider, according to a Fast Facts report from the Employee Benefit Research...

Nurse Practitioners Predict Doc Shortages, Care Access to Loom in 2024

by Sara Heath

Provider shortages, appointment wait times, increasing patient demand, and a shift toward more primary care are top of mind for nurse practitioners going into this year, says the American Association...

How Neighborhood Sways Pediatric Primary and Preventive Care Access

by Sara Heath

Kids from traditionally underserved communities tend to have lower pediatric primary and preventive care access rates than their peers from more affluent places, a new JAMA Network Open study showed....

How One Medical Delivers Culturally Competent Chronic Disease Management

by Sara Heath

When Cy Villaflores heard she was at high risk for developing diabetes, a signal from her family health history, she wasn’t quite sure what she should do next. Sure, her doctors all advised weight loss, but there wasn’t any...

Rethinking Alcohol Use Disorder Preventive Screening via Virtual Care

by Sara Heath

New data is showing that preventive screening for alcohol use dropped during COVID-19 surges, despite figures showing that alcohol use increased during the pandemic, prompting some experts to...

US Approach to Primary Care Access Struggles Is Disjointed

by Sara Heath

A new report from FAIR Health indicates that the United States is taking a patchwork approach to patient access to care and primary care, with the data showing variable reliance on advanced practice...

100M People Lack Primary Care Access, Usual Source of Care

by Sara Heath

A third of healthcare consumers are being left susceptible to public health threats and complications from untreated chronic illnesses as the US stares down primary care access problems, according to a...

How Community Health Workers Support Chronic Disease Management

by Sara Heath

A new study from the NYU Grossman School of Medicine shows how community health workers helped patients achieve optimal blood pressure control, underscoring the role these non-clinical workers play in...

Health Literacy, Care Access Barriers to Cervical Cancer Screening

by Sara Heath

Nearly one in 10 women have never had a common cervical cancer screening, like a Pap test, with issues such as limited health literacy and poor access to care getting in the way, according to a Harris...

Consumers Eye Primary Care Transition to Retail Clinics, Pharmacies

by Sara Heath

In five years, primary care access might not be defined by walking into a traditional brick-and-mortar clinic—not if consumers have anything to do about it, according to a new report commissioned...

Fewer Patients Have Usual Source of Care, Primary Care Provider

by Sara Heath

The number of Americans with a usual source of care has dropped 10 percent in the last 18 years, with only about three-quarters of people saying they have a regular primary care provider or at least a...

How ChristianaCare Integrated Oncology and Primary Care Access

by Sara Heath

When Nicholas Petrelli, MD, first heard that 15 percent of the gynecological cancer patients at ChristianaCare’s Helen F. Graham Cancer Center & Research Institute didn’t have primary care access, he knew it was...

Easier Primary Care Access Improved Chronic Disease Management

by Sarai Rodriguez

Irrespective of where a patient resides, having easier primary care access might be key to improving chronic disease management and detection for patients with hypertension, according to new research...

Universal Mental Health Screening in Primary Care Closes Care Gaps

by Sara Heath

Primary care clinics can effectively close the care gap for depression assessments by employing universal mental health screenings, according to researchers from the University of California San...

Travel Distance Key Barrier to Abortion, Reproductive Care Access

by Sara Heath

In a new assessment of reproductive and abortion care access, researchers have found that long travel distance is a leading barrier to care. The study, published in JAMA Network Open by researchers...