Lovelace and Atrinea Health have partnered to bring a new model for health care to Rio Rancho.

Thats according to Dr. John Cruickshank, the chief medical officer for Lovelace Health System. The model is called patient-centered medical home.

The Rio Rancho primary care clinic is owned and operated by Atrinea, which employs all the clinics health care providers including four primary care doctors who coordinate patient care and is exclusively for Lovelace Health Plan members.

What is different about the medical home model is that the physicians goal is simply to identify and treat common illnesses before illness can progress and before those illnesses get really, really expensive.

It seems simple enough, but its easier said than done.

The Rio Rancho clinic recently held a ribbon cutting, where Cruickshank and several others who are involved in the clinic spoke about the virtues of the new health care model. Cruickshank said the medical home model isnt really new, but it is new to New Mexico.

There have been many places around the country where this concept has taken hold and physicians and organizations have embraced the model, he said.

To help prevent or limit the severity of illnesses, physicians test for common illnesses according to the patients age, sex, weight and an assortment of other health indicators. Knowing about potential illnesses before they get too severe is key, Cruickshank said. But connecting patients to the appropriate tests and treatments that will keep them healthy takes a lot of work, he said.

As part of the partnership, Lovelace works with clinics like the one in Rio Rancho to keep tabs on patients and make sure they are making their appointments, according to Dr. John Iacuone, chief medical officer for the Lovelace Health Plan.

He said Lovelace has invested significant dollars in software that help the clinic keep track of what patients are billed for and shares that information with the clinic.

Original post:

New health care model centers on the patient