Family Voices of Maryland

Contact Information

Mary Baskar
(410) 768-9100
Mary@ppmd.org

Father and son The activities of Family Voices of Maryland (MDFV) at The Parents’ Place of Maryland (PPMD) focus on helping families partner in decision making for their children and on improving the system of care. MDFV provides assistance to families in many ways, including individual information and referral, parent matching, advocacy, training, and leadership skills development. Information and resources on many topics are shared through one-on-one contact, trainings and conferences, videos, listservs, e-mail newsletter, and PPMD website. A health care survey of parents on access to care and Medical Home showed that families, for the most part, prefer getting information from parent organizations and that financial hardship is fairly common across all families of CYSHCN, including loss of employment income and extraordinary expenses. These efforts are supported by funding from Maryland’s Title V agency and a CMS Family-to-Family Health Information Center grant.

HIGHLIGHT: Leadership Development
MDFV implemented an eight-month long training program for parents of CYSHCN. Topics included the parent movement in health care, family-centered care, cultural competency, MCHB’s 2010 objectives, how to effectively access private and public health insurance, and legislative activities related to health care in the state. Meetings with state legislators were the highlight of one of the training sessions. As result of this program, participants have increased their involvement in health care policy across the state, participating in a variety of task forces and advisory communities at the local and state levels.

BUILDING PARTNERSHIPS: Families and Providers
MDFV shares the family perspective with many Federal, State and local agencies by participating on a variety of task forces and advisory committees. MDFV enjoys ongoing partnerships with:

Maryland Title V
Medicaid
MCHB
Department of Health and Mental Hygiene
Department of Education,
AAP-MD Chapter
DD Council
Coalition of Children's Mental Health
Special Needs Children's Advisory Committee
Medicaid Advisory Committee
UCEDD Advisory Committee
State Interagency Coordinating Council (SICC)
hospitals and academic centers.

Working together with these partners, MDFV has been able to ensure that the voices of families are included in the process and development of policy at all levels of care.

WORKING TOGETHER FOR CYSHCN:
MDFV @ PPMD is very involved with partners in 2010 Activities: R Medical Home: Collaborating with Title V and AAP to implement the Medical Home State Plan, including “10 Around the Table” to educate pediatric practices.

Insurance Coverage: Collaborating with Medicaid to ensure parent involvement by placing a MDFV staff member at Medicaid state office to work on policy issues.
deaf and hard of hearing families statewide as part of newborn hearing screening activities with MD’s Title V.
Family Participation: Providing leadership development to diverse parents in inner cities and rural communities to strengthen their capacity to impact public policy.
Transition: Development of a web-based tutorial for parents and youth with special health care needs in collaboration with Title V.

Family Voices of Maryland

Contact Information

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Maryland