SDoH & Health Equity in the News
Health Affairs: (5/26) - Recently, the US has begun recognizing the importance of social context for individual and population health. This article explores the role of community benefit requirements for addressing social determinants and increasing health care value.
McKnights Home Care: (5/25) – A recent study in JAMA Network finds that patients transitioning from hospitals and skilled care to home care settings often have different experiences, with social determinants of health and racial disparities potentially playing roles.
Pharmacy Times: (5/25) – Issues like medication access and transportation cost all impact a patient’s ability to have access to medications and use them safely and effectively. This interview with Richard Smith, PQA Chief Engagement Officer, discusses how SDOH fits within PQA’s work.
Health Affairs: (5/24) – The authors of this Health Affairs blog post argue that improving the quality of race and ethnicity data -- paired with robust efforts to objectively measure unmet need -- will facilitate monitoring of health equity in Medicaid to ensure that all patients receive the highest quality care necessary to meet their needs. CMS and many state Medicaid programs have recently indicated that health equity is a priority. Now, investment in the data infrastructure needed to continuously evaluate the state of health equity in the program must follow.
Modern Healthcare: (5/23) – In an op-ed, leaders of Atrium Health argue that health systems must do more to address health disparities, including by expanding access to care, improving quality and outcomes, addressing acute social needs, and establishing community partnerships to address underlying social determinants of health.
Patient Engagement Health IT: (5/20) – The AMA, in partnership with the Brigham and Women’s Hospital and the Joint Commissioner, launched a learning network committed to helping hospital systems apply health equity to their quality and safety practices.
Healthcare Innovation: (5/20) – HealthierHere, a nonprofit, multi-sector collaborative based in King County, Washington, announced the launch of a Community Information Exchange, following its work in the Accountable Communities of Health program.
Patient Engagement HIT: (5/20) – The American Medical Association partnered with Brigham and Women’s Hospital and the Joint Commission to launch a learning network committed to helping hospital systems apply health equity to their quality and safety practices, with a goal of improving health outcomes for historically marginalized populations. The Advancing Equity through Quality and Safety Peer Network will equip participating health systems with the proper tools and knowledge needed to embed equity throughout their institutions’ health care delivery practices.
Managed Healthcare Executive: (5/19) – Social determinants of health have been on the minds of local, county, and state governments for years. This article portrays two jurisdictions – Kent County, Michigan and Maricopa County, Arizona – that have been conspicuously active in pioneering innovative programs addressing SDOH.
Managed Healthcare Executive: (5/18) – In this Q&A, Kate Sommerfeld, president of the Social Determinants of Health Institute, spoke about efforts to address social determinants of health gaining traction, taking an interconnected approach and using data analytics to understand the value of the efforts to address SDOH.
Metro Health: (5/17) – The MetroHealth System and Creating Healthier Communities (CHC) announced a new partnership to document the “MetroHealth Model” in a case study to be disseminated nationally, serving as an example to hospital systems, associations, businesses, nonprofits, and others about how to advance health equity in their communities through proven practices. MetroHealth’s Model incorporates a comprehensive approach to addressing SDOH in a community, focusing on everything from the environment to housing, including building a new hospital in an underserved area.
Health Affairs: (5/17) – Value-based payment (VBP) can be a useful tool for reducing health inequities and advancing equity goals, as VBP models provide more flexibility to address social drivers of health and provide care coordination. This article looks at the ACO REACH model, and discusses key design elements for explicitly addressing equity in the model, highlights examples of how some states and commercial payers have approached those same design elements, and identifies additional opportunities for the CMS Innovation Center to continue to test ways to embed equity into VBP models.
Patient Engagement HIT: (5/16) – More health care organizations are starting to design social determinants of health screening processes to help clinicians and organization leaders understand the social issues affecting the health and wellness of the organization’s unique patient population. As organizations begin to design their SDOH screening strategies, they will need to consider the tools they’ll use to deploy the screening, which determinants to look at during screening, and how providers will talk about SDOH with patients.
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