Education is a critical social determinant of health, largely because of its outsized impact on income and therefore other SDOH. There’s some clear-cut evidence underscoring the impact education has on overall health and well-being. In 2021, researchers published in PNAS that folks with higher educational attainment tend to live longer. Adults with a bachelor’s degree are expected…
The American Medical Association has criticized the new Medicare payment schedule proposed rule released last week by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, saying it fails to account for inflation in practice costs and “COVID-19-related challenges to practice sustainability.” The proposed 2023 Physician Fee Schedule (PFS) conversion factor is $33.08, a decrease of $1.53…
Patient navigators could be effective in closing racial disparities in primary care access, according to new data, with the healthcare professionals able to connect more Hispanic patients than if patients went at it alone. The report, published in the Journal of the American Board of Family Medicine, particularly showed that Hispanic patients working with a…
Value-based care is one of the key drivers of health system efforts to improve patient access to medical services, according to survey research from the Center for Connected Medicine (CCM). The Pittsburgh-based CCM’s “Top of Mind for Top Health Systems 2022” research report examines patient access solutions and strategies being considered and deployed at health…
Fundamentally, patient data access is about improving overall patient engagement and empowerment in care. Since meaningful use mandated patient portal adoption, the logic has dictated that a more informed patient would be a more educated and thus more engaged patient. Healthcare providers who have offered patient portal and clinical note access have seen a difference…
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.”…
While the term “Gen C” was first introduced circa 2012 by futurist Brian Solis as a way of describing a generation of connected consumers defined not by their age, geography, or income but by their hyper-connected, mobile-first mentality, it’s increasingly being used to describe post-pandemic-born babies. It’s also been applied to the mindset and expectations…
The COVID-19 pandemic put a spotlight on the health disparities across the United States and is fueling overdue discussion on how they can be systematically addressed to achieve the bigger goal of delivering the best care everywhere. Much of this discussion is focused around how to best leverage the valuable troves of health care data…
People living in rural America have lower incomes, less education, and are in poorer health than those living in other areas of the United States. For more than a century, these measures have been “sticky” with little change despite many efforts to do so. It is also well-known that most rural areas have a shortage of primary care and specialist physicians and lack of…
Having a good online presence and digital patient experience is more important than ever, with patients making healthcare access decisions after extensive research looking into cost, convenience, and online provider reviews, according to data from Kyruus in partnership with Wakefield Research. The annual survey, now in its fifth iteration, was emailed to journalists and revealed key insights…