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August 15, 2023

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Important Updates

Final Reminder! TCCN Antibiotic Stewardship Webinar: Why It's Important For Your Practice and Patients

Join us on August 16 at 12:30 pm as we continue our 3-part virtual series 'Antibiotic Stewardship: Why it's Important for Your Practice and Patients'.


This lunchtime series presents the new Georgia Pediatric Antibiotic Stewardship website, gpas-online.org, designed to help you in your busy practices with guidelines and a new antibiogram visualization tool.


Webinar #2: August 16, 12:30-1:30

  • Prescribing Guideline
  • The goal of this guideline is to help clinicians choose the most narrowly focused antibiotics based on the most likely bacterial pathogens and treat for the shortest effective duration


Please be sure to register in advance to receive the meeting link. Same-day registrations may experience issues with logging on.


If you missed it, click here to watch

Webinar #1: How to Access and Use the Website


Save the dates for upcoming webinars:


Webinar #3: November 1: Antibiotic Dosing

Register Now!

TCCN Sponsors the Children’s Annual Professional Staff Meeting

The Children’s Care Network is sponsoring the 2023 Children’s Annual Professional Staff Meeting next Wednesday, August 23 at 6:00 pm at the Children’s Support Center.


This meeting replaces the TCCN Fall Clinical Quality Forum, so your attendance at the event will count towards your 2023 meeting attendance requirement.

 

We have coordinated to make tables available for subspecialty physicians to connect with pediatricians and other physician attendees.


This networking opportunity has been requested by many of you and we strongly encourage pediatricians in particular to attend

 

Please note that this meeting will not be recorded. Come and enjoy free food, beer and wine! 


If you have not sent your RSVP and are planning to attend, please respond to the calendar invite that you should have received from Physician Communications or complete this online registration.

Click to Register

Phone Scam Targeting Physicians and APPs

Children’s has received several reports of phone scams targeting healthcare professionals, so we wanted to make you aware and share what you should do if you receive one of these calls.

 

In recent weeks, several physicians and Advanced Practice Providers (APPs) at Children’s have received calls from someone claiming to be a police officer or other law enforcement official, saying the physician or APP has failed to appear in court after receiving a subpoena and an arrest warrant has been issued. The caller either asks the physician or APP to pay a fine over the phone or to enter personal information into a website. This is a sophisticated scam – the calls appear to be coming from a legitimate county phone number and the caller gives the name of someone who is an actual police officer. 

 

If you receive a call like this, don’t share any information and contact your legal counsel for further assistance.

Payor Updates

Georgia to reinstate eligibility verifications 

The state of Georgia has begun reinstating eligibility verifications for Medicaid and PeachCare for Kids members, which were paused during the COVID-19 pandemic.


The Georgia Department of Human Services and Georgia Department of Community Health are asking Medicaid and PeachCare for Kids members to confirm their contact information as soon as possible before Medicaid redeterminations which were re-started on April 1. Practices can assist by notifying your patients and members that it is very important for all members to update their contact information. Members may update their contact information online, by phone, or in-person at a local DFCS office. 

 

Federal law requires all states, including Georgia, to check who is still eligible to receive Medicaid coverage within 14 months.


It is operationally critical for all practices to ensure they are conducting benefit verification during this time.

Quality Programs

Quality Steps Newsletter

Check out the latest issue here!

Value Added Services

For questions regarding TCCN Value Added Services, please reach out to

Barbara Douglas, TCCN Associate Director of Programs at Barbara.douglas@tccn-choa.org.

Flu Delivery for the 2023-2024 Season*

Flu season is just around the corner! 


For those practices who participate in the TCCN GSK Program – we wanted to make sure you are aware that they plan to start shipping flu doses around September 15, 2023


Please see the documents included in the links below for additional information about pricing, delivery instructions, etc.  



Please reach out to Barbara Douglas at barbara.douglas@tccn-choa.org or your GSK Rep if you have any questions.

New Form I-9 and Updates to Remote Verification Rules

On Aug. 1, 2023, U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services published a revised version of Form I-9, Employment Eligibility Verification. Among the improvements to the form is a checkbox employers enrolled in E-Verify can use to indicate they remotely examined identity and employment authorization documents under an alternative procedure authorized by the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) described below. While the new Form I-9 is now available for use, it is not required to be used until November 1, 2023. 


Click the links to read more about the final rule and additional resources.

Welch Allyn Spot Vision Screener Program

TCCN and McKesson are pleased to announce a special buying program for the Welch Allyn SPOT Vision Screener. This program is only available to TCCN Members through McKesson. Please see the brochure here for additional information.


EXCLUSIVE OFFER FOR THE CHILDREN’S CARE NETWORK

  • Offer valid April 1st, 2023 - September 30th, 2023
  • $500 Rebate + 5-Year Warranty (Valued at $1,736)
  • $2,236 in Total Savings!!!
  • Eligible devices for trade in include: Welch Allyn SureSight Vision Screener, Welch Allyn Spot Vision Screener (2.0 model), PediaVision, GoCheck Kids, Plusoptix, MTI, Topcon, Retinomax, Titmus V Series, Stereo Optical Vision Screeners, Canon, Reichert, Marco and/or iScreen brands

 

 Please contact your McKesson Rep for any questions.

New Medical Supplies Program - McKesson

The TCCN Value Added Services Team is excited to announce a new Medical Supplies Purchasing Program with McKesson! TCCN and McKesson have entered into a multi-faceted program for all TCCN Community practices!


Immediate Available Benefits:

  • 2 – 5% Estimated savings with special pricing on top 100 items 
  • Free Next Day Shipping – waived shipping minimums and fuel surcharge
  • .5% prompt pay 15 days, net 30-day payment terms


Click here for more program details

Community and Education

Children's Update- Expanded Behavioral and Mental Health Services Starting August 30

Last year, Children’s announced a transformational gift of land and facilities from David and Helen Zalik to accelerate our vision for treatment and intervention for kids needing Behavioral and Mental Health (BMH) care in Georgia. Beginning August 30, we will expand access to BMH psychiatry experts.

 

In this first wave, we will offer telehealth and in-person services, including medication management, psychiatric assessments, referrals to community care and bridge care for patients with acute psychiatric needs awaiting long-term treatment within the community.

 

These services will be offered to Children's providers for internal referrals only at first. Starting the week of August 7, BMH will accept referrals from Children’s physicians, psychologists and other referring providers through Epic.



As expansion continues, we will share information via email and our physician newsletters. 

Roadmap for Emotional Health Resources

As you may know, in 2022 we launched an MOC program for our subspecialty members based on the ABP’s Roadmap project designed to bring additional awareness and training to providers around emotional, behavioral, and mental health.


This program was highly successful and more than 25% of our subspecialists completed the training which focused on managing the emotional health of children with chronic conditions and their families.


This training is available to all providers regardless of specialty, and you can watch the 5-minute introductory video here and review more details about the program here including instructions on how to claim MOC credit.


Additional Training Available:


Cincinnati Children’s Grand Rounds: Addressing the Emotional Health of Children and Youth with Chronic Conditions and Their Families


Tune in for a 1-hour presentation about the American Board of Pediatrics Roadmap Project as part of the Cincinnati Children's Grand Round series. This presentation includes patient and parent voices, highlights resources to support the emotional health of children with chronic conditions and their families, and discusses the impact of bias on emotional health. This recording is a must-see for anyone interested in improving the emotional well-being of children, youth, and families affected by chronic conditions.

 

Physicians are eligible to receive ABP MOC Part 2 credit by viewing Grand Rounds and completing a short online post-test.

 

View the Grand Rounds Recording Here



The Roadmap Project maintains a website (www.roadmapforemotionalhealth.org/patients-and-families) with resources that you may find useful as you manage the behavioral health needs of both well patients and those with chronic conditions, including apps to support mindfulness and emotional health that have been reviewed by Psychologists. It includes a complete description of the various apps and appropriate age ranges. You will find culturally relevant resources for patients and families choosing a therapist. 


We have included links to those resources below as well. 


Pediatric Mental Health Training from the REACH Instititute

Free CME Opportunity for TCCN primary care physicians in 2023 and 2024!


This is an excellent opportunity for TCCN members to get free training in pediatric mental health. An Atlanta donor has granted the REACH Institute an opportunity to allow free training for the Patient-Centered Mental Health in Pediatric Primary Care (PPP) program, to primary care providers practicing in the Greater Atlanta area!

 

The course dates for this year and 2024 are: 


  • September 8 - 10, 2023
  • October 13 - 15, 2023
  • January 19 - 21, 2024


For More Information About the Program Click Here.


Participants will earn a maximum of 28.25 AMA PRA Category 1 CreditsTM for completing this program.


Click Here to Submit an Online Application for the Program


Required CME for Physicians - Sexual Misconduct

HB458 was passed into Law in 2021 and was effective January 1, 2022 and requires that each physician complete a 2 hour course in “professional boundaries and sexual misconduct in medical practice” before renewing their GA medical license (this is a one-time requirement).  

 

TCCN’s Malpractice Carrier, Curi, has two 1 hour CME courses on “Sexual Misconduct” that fulfills the new GA license requirement for HB458. Please see instructions below on how to access.

 

Instructions:

  • Login in to your Curi account at www.curi.com
  • Click on your initials at the far top right of your screen. (Your initials will appear with a yellow circle around them)
  • Select CME webinars
  • There you will find two new CME activities- Patient Harassment and Sexual Harassment


If you are not part of TCCN’s Malpractice Program with Curi, please reach out to your malpractice carrier as they may have a class available as well. 

 

We encourage you to check out Curi’s Learning Center for other CME offerings.

In Case You Missed It (please use the links below to review)


TCCN Requirements


TCCN Resources


Community Updates

Questions?

We are here for you. Please reach out to your TCCN Provider Relations Representative contact@tccn-choa.org with any questions.