Family-to-Family Health Information Center (F2F) - Families Together, Inc. Families Together, Inc. has been awarded a grant from Maternal and Child Health Bureau to serve the families in Kansas as a Family-to-Family Health Information Center (F2F). Three staff members are available to assist families of children with special health care needs to become good advocates for their children. Through this grant, Families Together, Inc. will increase educational training available to Kansas families of Children/Youth with Special Health Care Needs (CYSHCN). The staff members of the F2F Center will offer training to leaders in ethnic/minority communities to communicate the availability of services through F2F Centers.

WHAT ARE F2F HICs?

Family-to-Family Health Information Centers (F2F HICs) are non-profit organizations that help families of children and youth with special health care needs (CYSHCN) and the professionals who serve them.  Because the health care needs of CYSHCN are chronic and complex, parents and caregivers are often challenged with finding the resources to provide and finance health care for their children.  F2F HICs are in a unique position to help families because they are typically staffed/run by parents of CYSHCN themselves, and  as parents, they have traveled through the maze of services and programs designed to help CYSHCN.  Staff at F2F HICs understand the issues that families face, provide advice, offer a multitude of resources, and tap into a network of other families and professionals for support and information.  Family Voices, through the National Center for Family / Professional Partnerships, provides technical assistance, training, and connections to other F2F HICs and partnering organizations.

The Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA), Maternal Child Health Bureau (MCHB) provides the primary funding support for F2F HICs, as authorized by the Family Opportunity Act (FOA), legislation signed into law in 2006 (as a part of the Deficit Reduction Act). Through this funding, HRSA's MCHB currently supports F2F HICs in 30 states as of 2007. By 2009, all states and the District of Columbia should have FOA funded F2F HICs. Prior to the passage of FOA, funding from the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) and MCHB supported F2F HICs in many states, while a few other family organizations obtained state funding to conduct F2F HIC activities.