A Study on the Impact of Patient Centered Medical Home (PCMH) Implementation on Nursing Work Practice
Abstract
Primary care and nursing are important components of the U.S. healthcare system and are facing challenges of quality, access, cost, time spent and inefficiencies of clinical activities. Patient Centered Medical Home (PCMH) is a newly developed care model which has the potential to overcome these challenges. The present study uses a questionnaire approach to find the impact PCMH implementation may have on nursing practice and subsequently primary care. Analysis of the data collected from the questionnaire revealed some surprising results about the nursing practice. For example nurses spend less time on direct care and more time on indirect care and documentation. The nursing demand in terms of Full Time Equivalent (FTE) for nurses decreases. The future demand for nurses (not in FTE) shows an increase after PCMH implementation. The satisfaction level and overall health of patients, patient readmission, job satisfaction of nurses and department productivity shows improvement after PCMH implementation.