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Primary care in the United States has been in the midst of a transformation from a system based solely on individual office interactions to one that includes managing health at a population level. The chronic care model provides a robust framework for health systems to transform and restructure their delivery of care to one that is committed to delivering multidisciplinary quality care with a proactive approach. Patient and disease registries are the essential tools necessary to inform all elements of the chronic care model and guide practices though this transformation. Nationally as well as internationally, when used as part of a robust continuous quality-improvement program, registries have demonstrated to improve patient outcomes and reduce healthcare costs. Despite challenges practices may confront when initially developing a patient registry, it is evident that population management is now an important and integral component of a successful primary-care practice whose aim is to improve quality of patient care. Mt Sinai J Med 79:475-480, 2012 © 2012 Mount Sinai School of Medicine [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

An introduction to articles published within the issue is presented, including gender difference in health care diagnosis and treatment, patient portals as it relates to meaningful measures of stage 1 and 2 and the significance of evidence-based medicine to primary care providers.

An introduction to the journal is presented in which the editors discuss various reports within the issue on topics including patient-centered medical home (PCMH) and the chronic care model, chronic disease registries, and home-based primary care.