Access to a medical home for infants and young children with special healthcare needs

A medical home is a model of care to ensure the access to comprehensive, continuous, and family-centered services for children with special healthcare needs (CSHCN) and their families. The American Academy of Pediatrics and the Maternal and Child Health Bureau actively promote the medical home through grants to state health departments to develop medical home programs and to disseminate guidelines that describe best practices. However, until recently, there have been no population-based data about access to medical homes among infants and young CSHCN. Using data from the National Survey of Children with Special Health Care Needs, we report to what extent CSHCN younger than 3 years have a medical home. There were approximately 3800 responses related to children between birth and 3 years. In the United States, 54% of CSHCN younger than 3 years have a medical home. Access to a medical home is affected by income, mother's level of education, and the functional status of the child. In addition to describing access to a medical home among infants and young children, we also describe the characteristics of this population and the impact of infants and young children with special healthcare needs on their families.