Resources for Physicians

Breast Cancer Resources

The Teaching Providers, Reaching Women toolkit is now available online!

Patient Management

Quality improvement is a primary activity of the Center for a Healthy Maryland. The Center strives to assist physicians and other health and social services providers to better serve the patients or clients in their care. We provide current information on targeted health issues and programs, including communication tools and pertinent legislative updates.

Researchers at Johns Hopkins Hospital say communication between physicians and patients with high blood pressure is worse for blacks than for whites. This new study was published in the September 2009 issue of the Journal of General Internal Medicine. Click here for more information.

Requirements for Perinatal HIV Counseling, Testing and Referral: A Toolkit for Physicians

New regulations were approved in December 2009, following the enactment of the 2008 HIV/AIDS legislation aimed at reducing barriers to HIV testing in Maryland. A toolkit was developed by the Center in collaboration with the Infectious Disease and Environmental Health Administration, DHMH, which includes the latest information regarding HIV counseling, testing, and referral requirements in Maryland. Click here to download the Perinatal HIV Toolkit.

Cultural Competency CME Courses

Did you know that one in every ten persons in the United States is foreign-born? In Maryland, 12.6% of the population speaks a language other than English at home. Differences in language, culture, and background can result in poor communication between physicians and their patients, contributing to rising costs in healthcare.

Below is a list of online cultural competency CME Courses. Some of the courses are free and some have a free, please visit the websites below for more information regarding the course and its requirements.

A Physician’s Practical Guide to Culturally Competent Care
The Office of Minority Health at the US Department of Health and Human Services is offering the course, “A Physician’s Practical Guide to Culturally Competent Care.” This 9 continuing medical education credit course is being offered at no charge to practicing physicians, physician assistants, and nurse practitioners. Visit https://cccm.thinkculturalhealth.org/ for more information and to register.

MedScape CME Courses
Search database for free CME Courses Must register to search http://cme.medscape.com/

Quality Interaction for Physicians
2.5 CME Credits for completion of the course, valid thru April 1, 2010. Enter Organization ID # 1749 for registration. (ID can also be found under step-by-step instructions) http://www.ahip.org/disparities/QIModules/quality.html

Patient Safety

A primary goal of the Center is to promote activities to reduce medical errors and patient injuries. One important strategy in this effort is to improve communication between health care providers and their patients. In the United States today, about 90 million citizens do not understand basic health information and instructions. In our increasingly multi-cultural society, not only is health literacy a major concern, but the ability of patients and providers to effectively communicate due to language and cultural barriers is becoming a serious problem. The Center strives to educate the medical community and health care consumers about emergent health issues. Click on the following links for more information about patient safety:

• MRSA
• Health Literacy
• Advance Directive
• Organ Donation

Interpreter Resources

Physicians are required by law to provide foreign and sign language interpreters, if requested by a patient. With support from the Quality Health Foundation, the Center for a Healthy Maryland has created an online database of linguistic resources to help physicians address the language needs of their patients. In developing this database, the Center surveyed clinicians to determine the status of health literacy, language and cultural differences among their patients in addition to identifying barriers to effective communication and resources needed.

>> Click HERE for Interpreter Resource guide

Contact Information

For more information on Patient Management, please contact:

Roberta Herbst, M.S.
Program Manager
Phone: 410-539-0872 or 800-492-1056, ext. 3340
Fax: 410-649-4131
e-mail: rherbst@medchi.org