SpatiallyHealth

Leverage SDoH Technology to Improve Women’s Health - Spatially Health

Elizabeth Vazquez — Mon, 13 Mar 2023 13:56:57 GMT

The World Health Organization (WHO) identifies gender as a key social determinant of health (SDoH), making consideration of gender paramount in delivering quality care to patients around the world. Gender impacts health outcomes both through cellular and physiological pathways. Additionally, social constructs and expectations of gender impact patient health.

Though the research agrees on the relevance of considering gender, challenges persist when addressing gender as an SDoH, especially for women’s health. In particular, evaluating the impact of gender becomes complicated as gender intersects with several key other SDoH factors, such as socioeconomic status and race. For example, the CDC reported that non-Hispanic Black women had 2.9 times the maternal mortality rate as non-Hispanic White women in 2020.

Further, how to adequately capture gender proves challenging, as studies and disciplines utilize different sets of criteria. For instance, a recent epidemiology review quantified the hurdle of inconsistent standards.

All this has implications for how doctors incorporate gender as an SDoH when curating customized patient treatment plans. And with ACO REACH expectations, risk-bearing organizations are up against a deadline to find tooling to support their efforts to account for SDoH so they can deliver on health equity goals.

When considering gender as an SDoH, not all platforms will perform equally. As such, risk-bearing organizations should vet their selection to ensure the targeted intervention recommendations serve women fairly. Three questions to ask when determining if a platform works:

Is the platform dynamic? The tooling should update in real time so providers always have access to up-to-date intervention recommendations.
Can the analysis consider nuanced interplays of multiple SDoH factors? Modeling should account for the dynamic intersection of SDoH factors, such as gender, race, socioeconomic standing, neighborhood, food swamps versus food deserts, etc.
Does the data show it works? Successful platforms will result in both raised ROI for the risk-bearing organization and improved patient health outcomes.

Risk-Bearing Organizations Face Challenges in 2023 - Spatially Health

Spatially Health Team — Wed, 01 Mar 2023 15:29:21 GMT

This year, risk-bearing organizations may encounter hurdles. Having the right system in place to tackle the challenges can make a difference in the success they see. Here’s the kicker: risk-bearing organizations have the potential to thrive amidst these obstacles, both in terms of better patient health outcomes and measurable improvement in ROI. The platforms to aid them in doing so already exist. For instance, systems that consider social determinants of health (SDoH) from the onset can drive such success by supporting organizations on two fronts: staffing shortages and new regulations. First, the right solution can help lessen the burden of staffing shortages. Platforms that integrate with a group’s current system make less work for providers. For example, some models can deliver customized, evidence-based targeted intervention recommendations for each patient, accounting for each one’s individual SDoH, thus supporting doctors in including SDoH when designing care plans. In a system where providers are experiencing burnout at elevated rates, such a solution could be advantageous. Further, platforms can aid risk-bearing organizations in the changing compliance landscape. With the shift to value-based care, a need exists for groups to measure success. Here’s where the right solution matters. With a platform that leverages SDoH and dynamically adjusts with each patient, physicians always have access to up-to-date, relevant recommendations for every person. As a result of such personalized suggestions, patients can expect to see improved health outcomes. And in a value-based care model, better health outcomes can correlate with measurable increased ROI. Moving forward, those who rise to face the challenges of ongoing staffing shortages and the changing compliance landscape stand to win. This shift to value-based care will have success stories, and the risk-bearing organizations with the right systems in place will see their work pay out for both them and their patients.

Spatially Health Announces Partnership With ACO Health Partners Using Innovative Technology: Putting Health Equity into Action - Spatially Health

Spatially Health Team — Tue, 14 Feb 2023 05:41:05 GMT

Spatially Health and ACO Health Partners have teamed up to integrate Spatially Health’s Equity Equalizer™ platform into ACO’s current workflow. The platform uses proprietary geo-spatial and analytics models to analyze each patient’s SDoH barriers and provide targeted interventions to improve patient engagement and medical management programs. It also measures cost, meets CMS compliance requirements, and provides enhanced tools for mitigating risk and improving quality. The platform adjusts dynamically with added patient data and prioritizes patients by vulnerability. This partnership demonstrates Spatially Health’s commitment to advancing health equity and working with risk-based organizations to improve health outcomes for vulnerable populations.

Platforms should support providers in value-based care models - Spatially Health

Spatially Health Team — Tue, 14 Feb 2023 05:31:35 GMT

Transitioning to value-based healthcare models comes with growing pains. In particular, the issue arises of how to best treat patients within a value-based model that 1. keeps patients healthy, and 2. allows the risk-based organization to financially work. At that intersection is where social determinants of health (SDoH) come into play.

Spatially Health Announces Partnership With ACO Health Partners Using Innovative Technology: Putting Health Equity into Action - Spatially Health

Spatially Health Team — Tue, 14 Feb 2023 04:54:38 GMT

Spatially Health has announced a partnership with ACO Health Partners, LLC, a Jacksonville-based Shared Savings ACO. The partnership aims to leverage Spatially Health’s Equity Equalizer™ platform, which identifies health equity barriers at the patient level and provides targeted intervention recommendations that enhance patient engagement and improve medical management programs.

Spatially Health Co-founder & CEO joins Springboard's 2021 Digital Health Cohort - Spatially Health

Spatially Health Team — Mon, 18 Oct 2021 09:00:00 GMT

Spatially Health Co-founder & CEO, Hillit Meidar-Alfi, PhD is now part of Springboard Enterprises’ 2021 Health Innovation Hub: Digital Health Cohort.

Taking Bold Action to Close Health Disparities - Spatially Health

Spatially Health Team — Thu, 23 Sep 2021 23:00:00 GMT

Health disparities and how to address them have been part of the national dialogue for decades, dating back to President Ronald Reagan’s administration in the 1980s, according to reporting by the Association of American Medical Colleges. That’s when the federal government enacted laws and developed policies to help people who are underserved by healthcare services. Now, nearly 40 years later, against the backdrop of the COVID-19 pandemic and with substantial amounts of data supporting the widening of those disparities, the conversation about health inequity has been reignited. Payers and providers must pay attention to and address the inequality that exists and is driven by ethnic, social, economic and lifestyle influences if they want to offer effective healthcare services and achieve better outcomes for underserved individuals and populations, while also reducing healthcare costs.

Understanding Health Equity

In its Healthy People 2020 initiative, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) asserted that health equity allows all people to attain the highest level of health. The Institute of Medicine (now the National Academy of Medicine) noted in its 2001 report, “Crossing the Quality Chasm: A New Health System for the 21st Century,” that truly equitable care doesn’t vary because of personal characteristics, such as ethnicity, gender or age, or because of socially determined circumstances, such as gender identity, geographic location or socioeconomic status.”

Yet, despite the acknowledgment of what health equity is and the desire to achieve it, factors outside of the healthcare system continue to drive health inequality, according to an article published in May by the Kaiser Family Foundation. These factors, the subject of much research, are known as social determinants of health (SDoH), or the environmental conditions present in the geographic locations where people live, learn, work and play that influence their health, well-being, and quality of life. According to the Office of Disease Prevention and Health Promotion, social determinants of health include safe housing and neighborhoods, transportation, racism and discrimination, education and job opportunities, access to nutritious foods and physical activity, clean air and water, and language and literacy skills. Most often the populations that are most impacted by SDoH have lower socioeconomic positions, which correlate to poor health, the Kaiser Family Foundation found. In other words, the lower the household income, the unhealthier the individual is.

Population Health’s Response to Health Inequity

To mitigate SDoH’s effect on underserved populations, public health officials and healthcare organizations have implemented Population Health initiatives. Population Health has surfaced as a discipline that evaluates the health data of people living in a geographic location and strives to proactively improve their health outcomes by influencing their health behaviors. Research has found that changing health behaviors is most effective when combined with changing the broader environment that enables poor health choices, says a May 30, 2018, post on the Health Affairs Blog, produced by “Health Affairs,” the leading journal of health policy thought and research. Implementing these changes may involve developing practices or policies to remove barriers to health services and increasing opportunities to improve well-being.

In practice, a hospital that supports a local farmer’s market in an area with little access to wholesome and nutritious food choices is contributing to a Population Health initiative to influence behavior. The hospital’s actions encourage healthier eating, diminish the possible risks associated with poor nutrition and eventually lead to people in that community needing fewer medical interventions.

On the policy side, the Affordable Care Act (ACA), signed into law by President Barack Obama in 2010, drives Population Health successes by incentivizing providers who participate in programs that reduce health disparities. When these providers are rewarded financially by insurers on the federal marketplace, they are motivated to use their relationships with patients and their influence within their local communities to effect healthy changes in those areas. Additionally, the ACA includes 62 stipulations aimed at reducing or eliminating health disparities among racial and ethnic minorities and other vulnerable segments. The law also established six offices to ensure federal regulations incorporate health equity measures and established the National Center on Minority Health and Health Disparities as a part of the National Institutes of Health, according to the Association of American Medical Colleges.

But Population Health initiatives and the Affordable Care Act that rewards them aren’t the cure-all for health disparities. In fact, data continue to show that people of color and low-income individuals have higher rates of chronic and costly conditions and are still uninsured. Therefore, when individuals within these populations get sick, they tend to seek care in a hospital emergency room, leading to higher treatment costs. Moreover, their illness — often more serious due to lack of preventive care or delayed care — causes them to miss work, lose wages and disrupt the care of their families. So, their medical costs combined with these indirect costs strain their personal finances, drive up healthcare expenses and negatively impact the broader community. In fact, analysis reported by the Kaiser Family Foundation reveals that health disparities cause approximately $93 billion in excess medical care costs and $42 billion in lost productivity.

Health Inequity Highlighted by the Pandemic

Reduced access to care and unhealthy local influences for certain populations have been dramatically showcased during the COVID-19 pandemic. People of color, including Blacks, Hispanics, American Indian and Alaska Natives (AIAN), as well as Native Hawaiian and other Pacific Islanders (NHOPI), have higher risks of contracting COVID-19 and dying from the disease than their White and Asian counterparts. The Kaiser Family Foundation attributes this higher risk to these populations’ location, which often finds them living in multi-family households, working where close proximity is necessary, and relying on public transportation. The Foundation also notes that these populations often have underlying health conditions and seek testing and care for COVID-19 much later than other populations with better access to care and insurance coverage. Additionally, people of color, those with low incomes, and members of the LGBTQ+ populations have been disproportionately affected by job loss and mental health issues from the pandemic, setting up a vicious cycle that prevents them from improving their health.

With the development of the COVID-19 vaccine, another disparity has emerged, as Blacks and Hispanics have been less likely to receive the vaccine, the Kaiser Family Foundation report revealed. This could be from their inability to access vaccination sites during working hours or hesitancy due to their documented general distrust of healthcare providers or fear of government authority.

Whatever the reasons driving the disparities showing up in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic, it’s clear that solutions are needed to attain the health equity that saves lives and reduces overall healthcare costs.

A Tool for Reducing Disparities

Healthcare is local. Factoring in local influences using data helps address the first mile of the healthcare journey so that we’re not getting to the last mile with fewer tools, worse outcomes, and deeper costs.

Location intelligence and niche data that is now available, allows us to get a better understanding of external influences that affect individual’s day-to-day behavior and how that behavior impacts their health.

This data-driven approach can be used to develop benefit and care plans that are more tailored to an individual’s needs in closing the existing gap between underserved populations and those with better access to healthcare services.

Closing the gap on health disparities with a local approach

Hillit Meidar-Alfi — Wed, 24 Feb 2021 04:53:35 GMT

The Health Foundation of South Florida, the region’s largest philanthropic organization focused on achieving health equity in historically disadvantaged communities, recently named Melida Akiti as its new Board Chair.

Spatially Health creates modern data warehouse - Spatially Health

Editor — Tue, 22 Sep 2020 19:03:50 GMT

Spatially Health has been engaged by Provider Network Solutions (PNS) to develop an innovative data warehouse that addresses the shortcomings of traditional data warehouse models, allowing for advanced reporting and sophisticated analytics to capture business intelligence and promote data-driven growth for large and small operations alike.

How data analytics can help mental illness

Hillit Meidar-Alfi — Wed, 02 Sep 2020 14:14:54 GMT

Since a college internship assignment in 1973 that sent him to a state psychiatric hospital to investigate an autistic man being treated inhumanely, Steve Leifman has made it his life’s work to help people with mental illnesses. Now, an Associate Administrative Judge in the County Criminal Division of the Eleventh Judicial Circuit of Florida, covering Miami-Dade County, Judge Leifman’s name has become synonymous with the movement to keep people with mental illnesses out of jail and into appropriate medical and psychiatric treatment. In 2000, he created the 11th Judicial Circuit Criminal Mental Health Project, which includes pre- and post-arrest diversion programs for people with serious mental illnesses. The Project has become a national model for handling people with mental illnesses in crisis, and Judge Leifman has spearheaded efforts to bring to Miami-Dade County, the first-of-its-kind Mental Health Diversion Facility, expected to open next year.