Provider Alert! Texas Children’s Promotes Positive Adolescent Health
Date: June 21,2024
Attention: All Providers
Call to action: Texas Children’s Health Plan (TCHP) regards counseling and treatment for adolescent care as extremely important, especially in Behavioral Health. A patient’s impression of their visit directly impacts their compliance with aftercare and overall health outcome.
How this impacts providers: The best way for patients to feel they are receiving the best care possible is to have clear communication with their provider by implementing effective clinical practices. Based on the 2023 Experience of Care and Health Outcomes (ECHO) survey results, patients are rating their counseling or treatment lower than prior years.
2023 ECHO Survey Results
| Year | Explanation |
| 2021 | 76% of patients rated their counseling or treatment between an “8-10” out of 10. Ten represents the “best counseling or treatment possible”. |
| 2022 | 74% of patients rated their counseling or treatment between an “8-10” out of 10. Ten represents the “best counseling or treatment possible”. |
| 2023 | 69% of patients rated their counseling or treatment between an “8-10” out of 10. Ten represents the “best counseling or treatment possible”. |
Next step for Providers: To improve adolescent patient communication, TCHP encourages providers to complete the CE/CME course focused on Promoting Adolescent Health provided by Health and Human Services Commission (HHSC) available here. The learning objectives include the following:
- Summarize how regular health screenings and medical checkups help promote healthy adolescent development and may reduce common health complications and risky behaviors.
- Specify best practices for setting up a medical home and conducting comprehensive adolescent health screening during preventive checkups.
- Integrate effective communication strategies with adolescents and their parents or caregivers, including motivational interviewing, into routine adolescent health screenings and checkups.
- Apply state laws related to adolescent health privacy, consent and confidentiality, and abuse and neglect reporting requirements.
Providers should implement the communication strategies learned into their visits to positively impact the patients experience and therefore improve health outcomes.
If you have any questions, please email Provider Relations at: providerrelations@texaschildrens.org.
For access to all provider alerts,log into:
www.thecheckup.org or www.texaschildrenshealthplan.org/for-providers.
