To Our Patients and Parents,
It was six years ago when Dr. Russcol joined our practice. During those years she was an integral member of our team. She worked very well with her colleagues, and I had heard nothing but praise from her patients. It is therefore with some sadness for me to announce her plan to depart for another practice closer to her home at the end of July, 2018.
It will be important for those patients of Dr. Russcol to name another pediatrician in our practice as the primary care provider (PCP) and to notify the health insurance of this change, so that there will be no gap in their care.
Another change has occurred for patients on MassHealth. Since March 1st, 2018 MassHealth has assigned its members into several new health plans or accountable care organizations (ACO) as a way to manage cost of care while also trying to provide better care for its members. Our practice is part of the ACO called Tufts Health Together with Boston Children's ACO. This means that all our patients previously on MassHealth plans such as Neighborhood Health Plan (NHP), Network Health, or MassHealth PCC will need to be switched to this new ACO. Under this new set-up, our patients on MassHealth will be enrolled only in Tufts Health Together with Boston Children's ACO. Our MassHealth patients in this new ACO have to also switch their specialist physicians to those affiliated with Boston Children's.
Patients on MassHealth should have been notified by mail in December of 2017 of this change. It is possible that some patients of ours have been assigned to a different practice/primary care provider (PCP) by MassHealth by the location of their residency. Between March 1st and May 31st, there was time for individuals to switch the assigned practice for ACO. Starting June 1st, 2018, there will be only limited opportunity to switch from one ACO to another. Therefore, if you are on MassHealth and you have not paid attention to the notification from MassHealth about who is your assigned PCP, and if the assigned PCP is not one of us, we will be unable to accept you when you show up for an appointment, sick or well.
Sincerely,
Tien-Lan Chang, M.D.
Pediatric Associates of Malden