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The focus of this article is on an innovative strengths-based child protection effort initiated in Beaufort, South Carolina, that involved working with local systems and structures. Specifically, the program was a school-health partnership that sought to modify services provided to low-resource families to improve child outcomes. The primary components of the prevention program were home visiting and group well visits (GWVs). This article describes the program and the effects of the combined approach on health care utilization, child health status, and parental competence for families with low socioeconomic status. A matched pairs analysis of 102 families (51 intervention and 51 comparison families) was conducted. WB+ families were significantly more likely to attend all scheduled well-child visits (65% vs. 37%) and to be fully immunized (98% vs. 82%) than matched families who received traditional pediatric care. Intervention families had significantly greater recall of anticipatory guidance on safety (65% vs. 41%) and had greater satisfaction with care. Intervention infants were also noted to be statistically less likely to be overweight at 15 months of age (8% vs. 24%). The study demonstrated benefits on child health and parenting competence among families with low socioeconomic status. Implications for practice are discussed., (Copyright © 2015 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.)

Access to primary care doctors has been shown in studies across the world to result in better patient outcomes, increased satisfaction with care and lower health-care costs. Primary care is the entry point for most patients into the health-care system and focuses on prevention, chronic care management and availability for sick care. Primary care offices providing continuous, coordinated and accessible care are called medical homes. Changing disease patterns and increased amounts of chronic care has increased the importance of primary care medical homes to the health and well-being of patients. In the USA, however, fewer medical school graduates are entering primary care specialties such as pediatrics, family medicine and internal medicine, and the existing workforce is diminishing as primary care doctors retire as a result of overwork and poor job satisfaction.

This policy statement reaffirms the pediatrician's role in community pediatrics. It offers pediatricians a definition of community pediatrics and provides a set of specific recommendations that underscore the critical nature of this important dimension of the profession.

We have described a process in which one state's public health leaders provided a large degree of flexibility at the community level to improve pediatric health care access for children in need. This "room-to-wiggle" allowed program providers to tailor their programs to the specific needs of their communities while remaining faithful to the statewide goals. Among the most promising outcomes of the coordinated efforts to forge public-private partnerships is the continuation of the relationships that developed in the process and the further collaborations they have spawned.

In this review, we have suggested a variety of ways that we as health care providers can adapt our practices to provide the support necessary to increase the competency of families in parenting and nurturing their young. There are a variety of modalities worthy of consideration as methods that make the lives of our children that much better. In our quest to prevent child maltreatment, we need an emphasis on supporting families so that they can effectively provide the love and nurturing that all children require.

To determine Colorado American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) pediatricians' involvement in community-based activities and awareness of and interest in the AAP Community Access to Child Health (CATCH) program, a 22-item survey was mailed to all general pediatrician AAP fellows and candidate fellows practicing in Colorado (n = 434). The return rate was 65%. Of the respondents, 73% provide direct patient care as their primary professional activity, 58% reported either current or past involvement in community-based programs outside of their practices, 91% of this community-based work was voluntary, and 80% of the respondents described this work as moderate to very rewarding. Half of the respondents (51%) were aware of the AAP CATCH program, and 68% were interested in attending a statewide CATCH meeting. We conclude that Colorado AAP pediatrician survey respondents participate heavily in community programs outside of their clinical practices and that among this group there is substantial interest in the AAP CATCH program.