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Synergistic Care Model
— The Synergistic Care Model is an expansion upon the concept and mandate in healthcare known as the Standard of Care. It applies itself to a true application of the term holistic, which dictates that each individual patient should have all healthcare providers involved in their care actively working together to ensure that health related outcomes and overall quality of life is paramount.

Standard of Care:
— As stated in many publications, and via the laws of both states and federal governments, the standard of care is fundamental to the manner in which healthcare providers must apply their expertise while rendering services to the patients who endow them with trust. It is a concept that has an elegantly simplistic core, and a relatively complex set of definitional expectations: In tort law, the standard of care is the only degree of prudence and caution required of an individual who is under a duty of care. The requirements of the standard are closely dependent on circumstances.[1] Whether the standard of care has been breached is determined by the trier of fact, and is usually phrased in terms of the reasonable person. It was famously described in Vaughn v. Menlove (1837) as whether the individual "proceed[ed] with such reasonable caution as a prudent man would have exercised under such circumstances". It is further defined in the following major ways: 1. Diagnostic and treatment process that a clinician should follow for a certain type of patient, illness, or clinical circumstance. Adjuvant chemotherapy for lung cancer is "a new standard of care, but not necessarily the only standard of care". (New England Journal of Medicine, 2004) 2. In legal terms, the level at which an ordinary, prudent professional with the same training and experience in good standing in a same or similar community would practice under the same or similar circumstances. An "average" standard would not apply because in that case at least half of any group of practitioners would not qualify. The medical malpractice plaintiff must establish the appropriate standard of care and demonstrate that the standard of care has been breached, with expert testimony. 3. A physician also has a "duty to inform" a patient of any material risks or fiduciary interests of the physician that might cause the patient to reconsider a procedure, and may be liable if injury occurs due to the undisclosed risk, and the patient can prove that if he had been informed he would not have gone through with the procedure, without benefit of hindsight. (Informed Consent Rule.) Full disclosure of all material risks incident to treatment must be fully disclosed, unless doing so would impair urgent treatment. As it relates to mental health professionals standard of care, the California Supreme Court, held that these professionals have "duty to protect" individuals who are specifically threatened by a patient. [Tarasoff v. Regents of the University of California, 17 Cal. 3d 425, 551 P.2d 334, 131 Cal. Rptr. 14 (Cal. 1976)]. 4. A recipient of pro bono (free) services (either legal or medical) is entitled to expect the same standard of care as a person who pays for the same services, to prevent an indigent person from being entitled to only substandard care.[2] Medical standards of care exist for many conditions, including diabetes,[3] some cancers,[4] and sexual abuse.[5] Failure to provide patients treatment that meets a standard of care can incur legal liability for any injury or death that results. In large-scale disasters, public authorities may declare crisis standards of care apply. This allows overwhelmed medical to triage patients, directing resources toward patients they think need it the most, by giving other patients less than the normal standard of care. For example, this occurred during the COVID-19 pandemic in Arizona.

Expansion upon terms:
— Synergistic Care, as demonstrated by its practitioners, proponents and academics, is based on the concept that each patient should experience care that encourages any and all healthcare providers that they select to manage their care to work in a collaborative manner.

This collaborative approach is believed to ensure that “no stone is left unturned” in response to patient needs (emergency, urgent and primary) and ongoing wellness goals.

Practitioners who adhere to this model are known to opt to expand upon communication skills within their practice and as it applies to communication with the other practices selected by their patients.

They may invest in development of interdisciplinary communication and/or referral forms (electronic and/or manual) to further expedite the process of arriving at a fully formed course of treatment in cooperation with other providers.

Implementation for Healthcare Providers:
— There are several programs that have emerged in recent years to address this need in patient care coordination and collaboration.

Many of these programs are directed at active medical and dental students without a focus upon providers in current practice nor healthcare professionals in supportive fields like physical therapy, chiropractic care, nutritional support/dietetics, and many others.

The information provided by these programs demonstrates the enhancement in overall quality of patient life as well as an array of benefits to active treatment plans. Generally, the programs offer either live training for providers and support staff or virtual visits that are conducted via a streaming video platform such as Zoom, GoToMeeting, MIcrosoft Teams and/or Skype.

The presentations are generally conducted for a moderate fee which covers the costs associated with all pertinent materials, video conferencing and/or travel to practice locations. Some programs are offered on a complimentary basis; however those appear to be rare in the years following the COVID-19 global pandemic.

Some pioneers of this model have been known to host provider micro-conferences or share editable provider documents to facilitate the essential utility and communication in this model of patient care.

There are some providers that have understood the power that can be gained through the adoption of this model of care after the effectiveness is demonstrated to them in a practical way. They have further begun to champion the ideological shift from disconnected interdisciplinary care to applied synergistic care.

Reference Links:
— 1) https://www.niioh.org/ 2) https://www.safetynetmedicalhome.org/sites/default/files/Structuring-Referrals-Dentistry.pdf 3) https://hsdm.harvard.edu/integrating-oral-health-and-primary-care 4) https://cipcoh.hsdm.harvard.edu/