The Blue Cross Blue Shield of Texas Special Beginnings® (BCBSTX) and Centering Healthcare Institute (CHI) are pleased to offer up to 20 Implementation Awards from Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Texas Special Beginnings® initiative to help clinical practices implement the CenteringPregnancy care model. The service awards are available in the four county regions in the state of Texas including the counties Harris, Fort Bend, Galveston, Dallas, Tarrant, Rockwell, Travis, Willianson, Bastrop, Hays, Hidalgo and Cameron.

The goals for this initiative include:

1. Reduce the rates of preterm birth, low birth weight babies, and NICU admissions
2. Improve prenatal and postpartum visit compliance with participating members
3. Improve access to high quality and patient-centered maternity care for communities at risk for poor birth outcomes.

Award Qualification Criteria

• Practice must be a qualifying physician practice or hospital system. It can be an FQHC or look-alike, Indian Health Service site, CAH Birthing Centers, Community Health Clinics, or other qualifying practice.
• Practice must be in-network with Blue Cross Blue Shield of Texas
• Provide obstetric primary care that will transition to CenteringPregnancy
• Have adequate patient volume for group care (e.g. 150 obstetric patients per year per location for CenteringPregnancy)
• Have a group space identified that is appropriate for CenteringPregnancy (if the room is not dedicated, Centering will have priority use)
• All applicants must submit a completed Centering Readiness Assessment and meet the basic requirements for becoming and remaining a Centering practice

Award Details

These awards will cover one year of implementation support from the CHI team including:

• First year annual site license fee
• First year implementation support
• First year Kickoff Day site visit
• Centering Facilitation training workshop for up to 15 participants
• Centering Advanced Facilitation training for 1 participant
• Site accreditation visit and determination
• Patient Notebooks 180 (shipping included)
• Centering Teleheath playbook download
• Facilitator Leader Kit

IMPORTANT: This is NOT a monetary award. It is an award for in-kind services.

Expected Deliverables

Once the site starts to implement Centering, these are the expected deliverables.