This course will next be held in spring of 2026.

Information in this site is for the 2024 course.

Includes strategies to address the challenges of transition and transfer of patients with complex medical needs

In this special program, faculty from Harvard Medical School, the Brigham and Women's Hospital Transition Care Team, and the Boston Children’s Hospital BRIDGES Adult Transition Program provide strategies, best practices, and guidance to:

• Identify adult care providers and successfully transfer patients with rare or complex health care needs
• Assess and improve the efficacy of your current transition processes
• Tailor transition strategies to patient age, disease type, and physical/ intellectual capability 
• Develop transition policies to support your specific practice needs
• Significantly improve inter-practice care coordination
• Approach reimbursement in 2024
• Ensure up-to-date, portable, and accessible medical summaries
• Build your transition team, processes, and consultation program
• Innovate transition processes with telehealth and social media
• Optimize care coordination and inter-practice communication

Practical, Results-Focused Education

Faculty share strategies and best practices that can be readily implemented by pediatric, pediatric subspecialty, and adult care providers to optimize how you:

• Assess patient readiness for adult care
• Time patient transitions for the best outcomes
• Ensure adherence
• Teach self-care and self-management
• Promote medical and educational self-advocacy
• Address sexual health and fertility with young adults
• Strengthen family engagement
• Provide care for college students
• Screen for high-risk behaviors
• Help patients maximize their independence

Meeting the Requirements of Special Patient Populations

Education and workshops are led by nationally and internationally recognized experts with extensive expertise in the care, transition and transfer of patients with:

• Developmental disabilities
• Intellectual disabilities
• Autism
• Common and complex chronic conditions, including:
  • Diabetes
  • IBD
  • Cystic Fibrosis
  • Congenital Heart Disease
  • Epilepsy
  • Sickle Cell Disease
  • Spina Bifida
  • Substance Use Disorder
  • Cancer Survivorship
  • Organ Transplantation
  • Obesity

Tools and Resources

Participants will receive a variety of tools and resources, including:

• Transition checklists
• Sample transition curricula
• Readiness assessments
• Transition plans and processes
• Transition policies
• Up-to-date transition coding and reimbursement tip sheets

If you provide care for—or are preparing to accept—pediatric patients who are transferring to adult care, this course will prove invaluable. It will inform, update, and inspire you, and you will return to your practice empowered to be a more effective clinician in the care of these patients.

Education for Pediatric, Family Medicine, Internal Medicine, and Subspecialty Practices

Taught by nationally renowned experts, this program provides state-of-the-art strategies to optimize clinical practices, effectively transition patients to adult care, and help patients elevate their quality of life in the following types of practices:

Pediatric Practices: Strategies and Best Practices to Successfully Transition Young Adults to Adult Care

• Transition timing and tracking of progress
• Assessing functional capacity to determine need for guardianship
• Developing individualized transition plans
• Devising and implementing effective transition policies

Family Medicine and Medicine-Pediatric Practices 

• Encouraging adherence through shared decision-making:  when, why, how
• Differentiating treatment as patients age
• How to expediently teach self-management skills
• Current approaches to preventative counseling and anticipatory guidance
• Strategies for pediatric practices having difficulty finding adult medicine care into which they can transition patients with chronic or medically complex conditions 

Internal Medicine Practices: Strategies and Best Practices to Successfully Onboard Young Adults into Your Practice

• Understanding unique needs of patients with pediatric acquired illness
• Quality improvement strategies to optimize care of young adults
• Updates to prevent adverse health outcomes as patients move to adult care
• Accommodating needs of young adults with developmental disabilities in your setting

Pediatric Subspecialty Practices

• Screening for high-risk behaviors and their impact on chronic illness
• Educating patients on impact of chronic illness on future fertility and pregnancy risks
• Best practices for transition timing: start early and track progress
• Referring to adult primary care providers as medical home for young adults
• Strategies for pediatric practices having difficulty finding adult medicine care into which they can transition patients with chronic or medically complex conditions 

Adult Subspecialty Practices

• Encouraging adherence to optimize health outcomes
• Addressing sexual health and fertility issues
• Gynecological care for women with intellectual disabilities
• Utilizing shared decision-making to set goals with patients
• Accommodating needs of young adults with developmental disabilities in your setting