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WASHINGTON — Improved coordination between primary care providers and retail pharmacies and clinics is the aim of a collaboration announced earlier this month between the Health is Primary campaign and CVS Health.
The partnership will advocate for patient access to coordinated, continuous care and help ensure all consumers have access to a primary care provider, according to Family Medicine for America’s Health LLC, a collaboration between eight family medicine organizations in the United States that jointly launched the Health is Primary initiative last year as a multiyear campaign to drive continued improvement of family medicine and demonstrate the value of primary care.
The Health is Primary campaign will work with CVS Health to disseminate patient materials that provide a road map for understanding the various resources available through the medical neighborhood while helping them know when and where to access these services.
In addition, the campaign will highlight models of collaboration that can help accelerate a shift to a primary care-based health care system.
“Patients should expect both convenient access as well as high-quality health care,” states Andrew Sussman, executive vice president and associate chief medical officer of CVS Health and president of CVS/minuteclinic. “We know that patient health and outcomes improve when patients utilize the resources available to them throughout the medical neighborhood and when providers across the health care system are working together. By partnering with primary care and family medicine, we will continue to improve provider collaboration and help ensure all patients have access to primary care within a coordinated medical neighborhood.”
CVS Health operates more than 7,900 retail drug stores and more than 1,000 walk-in medical clinics.
The Health is Primary campaign is traveling to cities around the United States to engage local stakeholders and showcase community-level interventions that are working to enhance and expand primary care and improve health. Health is Primary also coincides with the ongoing strategic initiative to transform family medicine to meet the changing needs of the health care system.
“We cannot address the biggest health care problems in this country without a strong primary care foundation and true collaboration across the health care system,” remarks Glen Stream, a family physician and president of Family Medicine for America’s Health.
