Virtual Integrated Practice at Rush

Virtual Integrated Practice

About the Virtual Integrated Practice

Introduction

Virtual Integrated Practice, or VIP, is a coordinated, communication-driven model of health care delivery developed by faculty at Rush University Medical Center in Chicago. It is designed to address the challenges and obstacles of managing the care of elderly and chronically ill patients with complex needs. Although interdisciplinary teams and ongoing team management of patients form the core principles of VIP, this new approach is designed to develop effective team building and ongoing collaboration among health care providers who do not work together in practice in the same locations or even organizations. It replaces the logistical obstacles of having clinicians meet in person to discuss patient cases with a system of communicating and meeting "virtually" using an appropriate variety of readily available technologies. Download a presentation on the Virtual Integrated Practice approach.

Project Goals

Major goals of the VIP include:

Refining the VIP intervention and implementing it over an 18 month period in four practice sites focusing on patients with diabetes type II, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease and urinary incontinence.
Evaluate the efficacy of the intervention with regard to consistency, costs, patient and provider perception, selected patient indicators of health status and changes in disease specific health parameters.
Promote practitioner usage of VIP locally and nationally and distribute findings of VIP intervention through a variety of collaborative activities.

Funding Support and Leadership

VIP is a four-year project supported through a grant from the John A. Hartford Foundation's "Geriatric Interdisciplinary Teams in Practice" initiative. The project is administered through the Department of Preventive Medicine at Rush. The Principal Investigator for the VIP project is Dr. Steven K. Rothschild, Associate Professor of Medicine and Co-director of the Section of Community and Social Medicine in the Department of Preventive Medicine. The Co-principal Investigator is Dr. David Lindeman, Director of the Mather Institute on Aging in Evanston, Ill.

For more information on VIP or to request colleagues be added to the mailing list, contact Stan Lapidos, Project Manager at (312) 942-2753 or stan_lapidos@rush.edu.

Geriatrics Integrated Team Training



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