Build Your Own Care Notebook
What is a Care Notebook?
The Care Notebook has multiple uses. A major role of this notebook is to help parents/caregivers maintain an on-
going record of their child's care, services, providers, and notes. This notebook is a great tool in empowering families
to become the experts on their child's care. It is also a way to maintain the lines of communication between the
many providers and services that help care for a child and their family.
Health professionals recommend that parents/ caregivers bring this notebook to all medical appointments, thera-
pies, care conferences, on vacations, etc. Health professionals can encourage the use of these notebook by either
having them available at the first office visit, upon discharge from the hospital or in the waiting room on a resource
table. This notebook should be a team responsibility. Office staff should offer families assistance in filling out the
various forms. Medical offices can copy visits, check ups, immunization records, specialist reports, clinical pathways,
and give them to families to insert into the notebook.
Why build your own Care Notebook?
The Care Notebook is an organizing tool for families and will help you keep track of important information. Care
Notebooks are very personal to your child and ideally should be customized to reflect your child's medical history and
current information. For this reason, this web site has been developed to allow you to build a Care Notebook that
best meets the need of your child.
Find out more about how to use the Care Notebook web site to create your own personal care notebook by taking
the Care Notebook Online Tour.
How do I build my own Care Notebook?
Twenty Care Notebooks have been divided into sections with similar content and made available in both Microsoft
Word and PDF formats. Your computer must have Microsoft Word software to open and use the Word documents or
to delete, modify, or add your own text to reflect the information you want to include in that particular section of
your Child's Care Notebook. You will need the free Adobe Reader on your computer to open and view the PDF
documents. You can fill-in and print completed PDF forms from the web site or print blank forms and complete them
manually. You cannot save completed PDF forms unless you purchase and have Adobe Acrobat software on your
computer. Most people will want to fill-in and save the Care Notebook documents and this is most easily done with
the word documents. However, those who do not have Word software on their computer are able to use the PDF for-
mat version with the understanding that the forms cannot be altered (or changed). It is recommended to view the
online examples before building your own care notebook.
Build your own Care Notebook: http://www.medicalhomeinfo.org/CareTour/tutorial.htm
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Collaborations May 2008 Update
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