Referrals and Hope Are Not a Strategy (with Dr. Mary Ann Woodruff & Rachel Lettieri)

<p>In this video episode of Thrive Together, hosts Maya Smith and Jason Lehmbeck speak with Dr.</p><p>Mary Ann Woodruff and Rachel Lettieri, LCSW, of Pediatrics Northwest, a pediatric group that</p><p>has served families in the South Sound region of Washington for more than 50 years.</p><p>Mary Ann is a general pediatrician who saw patients for 36 years and is now the Medical</p><p>Director of Care Transformation as well as the Washington Medical Director for Reach Out and</p><p>Read.</p><p>Rachel directs Care Transformation and built the practice’s community health worker division.</p><p>Both were fellows in the Thrive Center’s Innovation Hub.</p><p>Pediatrics Northwest treats the pediatric medical home as a universal touchpoint, the one place</p><p>nearly every family returns to with their child, and uses it to bridge physical health, behavioral</p><p>health, and unmet social needs.</p><p>Community health workers from the community accompany families: they help navigate</p><p>systems like early intervention and behavioral health, reduce stressors, and build the confidence</p><p>to make a first call. The team has protected one non-billable day a week for community health</p><p>workers to be out building relationships with the resources they connect families to, a choice</p><p>they have held for four years even while billing Medicaid for those services. Their work grew</p><p>from a Medicaid waiver grant for collaborative care and behavioral health integration in 2018</p><p>and 2019, and it is part of Pediatrics Supporting Parents, a five-community national initiative</p><p>with Zero to Three to strengthen early relational health in well-child visits.</p><p>The through-line, in Mary Ann’s words: children’s brains develop in relationships, not systems,</p><p>and so our systems have to catch up with that science.</p>