Garrett Schmitt | VBCExhibitHall Library

Quality measures don’t match patient-reported outcomes in inpatient behavioral health

November 10, 2021Garrett SchmittNo CommentsBehavioral Health, inpatient behavioral health, JQQ, mental health, NAQH, patient experience, patient outcomes, patient reports, Patient Satisfaction, psychiatric hospitals, quality measures, quality of care, self-reported outcomes, SROs

At psychiatric hospitals and other inpatient behavioral health facilities, good performance on routine quality measures does not necessarily lead to improvement in symptoms and other patient self-reported outcomes (SROs), reports a study in the November/December issue of the Journal for Healthcare Quality (JHQ), the peer-reviewed journal of the National Association for Healthcare Quality (NAHQ). “[O]ur analyses suggest…

What Private Equity Firms Do to Hospitals

November 10, 2021Garrett SchmittNo Comments

In a column I wrote last year, I called private-equity firms “healthcare’s house flippers” because what they do—maximize the value of an acquired hospital or medical practice to turn a quick profit—is a lot like what house flippers do—maximize the value of an acquired house to turn a quick profit. We know from watching home-improvement…

Applying Value Chain Thinking to Social Drivers of Health: A Framework and Two Case Studies

November 10, 2021Garrett SchmittNo Comments

Value chain thinking is an essential component to bring about successful collaboration among the distinct stakeholders involved in social drivers of health programs. Two case studies describe the importance of grounding such efforts in the value propositions that matter to the participants (patients or health plan members) and the partners (health care providers, payers, and…

RECORDED WEBINAR: How Diagnostic Telemedicine Solutions Improve Eye Care Results Within The Diabetes Population

November 10, 2021Garrett SchmittNo Commentsdiabetes, diabetes care, diabetes management, diabetic retinopathy, diagnostic telemedicine, diagnostics, ey care, eye-care, point-of-care testing, retinopathy, Telehealth, Telemedicine, Webinar

Download Slides In the year 2000, there were an estimated 20 million patients with diabetes. Today that number is around 30 million*. Unfortunately, a serious complication that affects this population’s eye care is not often discussed: Diabetic Retinopathy (DR). In fact, DR is the number one cause of vision loss among people with diabetes but…

EHRs may present barriers to health equity research for deaf patients

November 9, 2021Garrett SchmittNo CommentsAmerican Sign Language, ASL, deaf, deaf patients, deafness, EHRs, equity, health inequity, healthcare communication, SDOH, social determinants of health

A perspective paper published this week in the Journal of the American Medical Informatics Association outlined barriers to health equity research serving deaf and hard-of-hearing patients, and how EHRs may be making such barriers worse. Although EHR systems can be useful when it comes to identifying health inequities, researchers noted that they may also be interfering…

Small primary care practices that received training in quality measures to enhance care improved patient outcomes

November 9, 2021Garrett SchmittNo Commentsenhanced care, patient outcomes, PCPs, Primary Care, primary care practices, quality measures, training

A team of family medicine researchers conducted an assessment to determine if the implementation of policies and workflows designed to improve quality of care in smaller primary care practices was associated with improved health outcomes for patients with cardiovascular disease. The study also examined whether enhancements in quality improvement capacity are associated with a change…

NEW EQUITY METRIC LAUNCHED TO ASSESS PLAN MEMBERS’ DIGITAL ACCESS, LITERACY

November 8, 2021Garrett SchmittNo Commentsdigital access, Digital Landscape, equity, equity assessment, health equity, health literacy, healthcare literacy, literacy, patient access, patient communication, Patient Engagement, SDOH, social determinants of health, Socially Determined

Socially Determined, the Washington, D.C.-based technology company that measures the impacts of the social determinants of health (SDOH), has developed Digital Landscape, a new metric for assessing digital equity as an SDOH component. Using Digital Landscape, organizations can assess equity “within a population or community and the impact it has on health outcomes and business performance.”…

AHA 2021 Puts Scientific Dialogue, Health Equity Center Stage

November 8, 2021Garrett SchmittNo CommentsAHA, American Heart Association, health equity, Scientific Dialogue, Scientific Sessions

Virtual platforms democratized scientific meetings during the COVID-19 pandemic but, as any meeting-goer will tell you, it’s the questions from the floor and the back-and-forth of an expert panel that often reveal the importance of and/or problems with a presentation. It’s the scrutiny that makes the science resonate, especially in this postfactual era. The all-virtual…

CMMI’s Strategy Refresh: What Hospices Need to Know

November 8, 2021Garrett SchmittNo Commentsaccountable care, ACOs, CCMI, Center for Medicare & Medicaid Innovation, hospice, Medicaid, Medicare, National Hospice & Palliative Care Organization, NHPCO

The Center for Medicare & Medicaid Innovation (CMMI) in October announced a “strategy refresh” that would guide development of its future payment models. If executed effectively, the strategy could make a substantial difference in hospice and palliative care as well as the health care system at large, a trio of experts told Hospice News. The…

Health Equity and Health Disparities: The Role of Health IT and the Need to Standardize Data Collection

November 4, 2021Garrett SchmittNo CommentsData, data collection, health data, health disparties, health equity, health IT, healthcare data, SDOH, social determinants of health, standardized data collection

Health disparities are a long-standing challenge in the United States and worldwide. In light of the COVID-19 pandemic and its higher impact on vulnerable and marginalized groups, more attention is being directed towards achieving health equity. With a focus on the relationship between health, social factors, and their role in public health, researchers, policy makers…