Must See Health Equity Resources

This articles discusses how telehealth can lead to more equitable health care access by increasing access to cost-effective, culturally competent care for people living in disadvantaged communities.

This guide will help health care workers implement an evidence- and consensus-based framework for improving patient outcomes and advancing health care equity.

The updated data modernization strategy for 2024-2025 lays out priority work for the next two years to continue to improve our capabilities for early threat detection and real-time monitoring across all levels of public health.

Read about The Joint Commission’s updated National Patient Safety Goal for ambulatory health care organizations, behavioral health care and human services organizations, critical access hospitals and hospitals.

This webinar from the Indiana Hospital Association focuses on how social behaviors can affect health, along with how to use Z codes to better track patients' needs and identify solutions to improve the health of their communities.

Among other things, this final rule revises the Medicare hospital inpatient prospective payment systems (IPPS) for operating and capital-related costs of acute care hospitals.

This study examined the association between perceived racial-ethnic inequities in COVID-19-related health care and willingness to get a COVID-19 vaccine.

This report describes a three-pronged framework for reducing the number of firearm injuries and deaths.

The World Health Organization (WHO) developed the Operational Framework for Monitoring Social Determinants of Health Equity to measure, assess and address the social determinants of health and health inequities from a cross-sectorial perspective.

The November 2023 U.S. Playbook to Address Social Determinants of Health from the White House lays out an initial set of structural actions agencies are taking to collaborate and support equitable health outcomes across communities.

A study of the connections between environmental risks and health found that Black and Latinx individuals living in Austin, Texas, had an increased asthma-related health burdens due to increased air pollution levels. The study suggests that even small adjustments in air pollution levels can impact the frequency of asthma-related emergency care, especially among marginalized communities.

This document shares information about the Screening for Social Drivers of Health Measure. The measure assesses whether a hospital implements screening for all patients that are 18 years or older at time of admission for food insecurity, housing instability, transportation needs, utility difficulties and interpersonal safety.

This document lists and answers frequently asked questions about Social Drivers of Health (SDOH) Measures used by hospitals particpating in the Hospital Inpatient Quality Reporting (IQR) Program.

For the CY 2023 reporting period/FY 2025 payment determination under the Hospital Inpatient Quality Reporting (IQR) Program, hospitals will need to confirm that they engaged in the activities described in this Attestation Guidance Document during January 1, 2023, to December 31, 2023.

The majority of health care providers and payers are not ready to meet shifting health equity regulatory requirements, according to Ernst & Young's latest report. To compile its "2024 Health Equity Outlook," the accounting firm surveyed 500 health equity leaders across stakeholder industries: Providers, payers, life sciences, government and nonprofit/community organizations.

This resource gives instructions for hospitals participating in the Hospital Inpatient Quality Reporting (IQR) Program.

The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) employs a multifaceted approach to enhance health care, using quality measurement, public reporting, value-based payment programs and health and safety standards enforcement. Read about CMS's mission to improve quality across the health care system.

The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) has introduced an updated framework to enhance health equity, broaden coverage and boost health outcomes for over 170 million individuals in its programs. The CMS framework focuses on reinforcing assessment infrastructure, fostering collaboration across the health care system for structural improvements and eliminating barriers to CMS-supported benefits and services.

The National Association of Chronic Disease Directors funded six organizations from across the U.S. to implement Million Hearts® strategies among priority populations to reduce health disparities and improve cardiovascular health.

This article describes a quality improvement project undertaken to increase the percentage of patients who had a psychosocial assessment after being discharged from the hospital to a contracted skilled nursing facility.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) maintains this website, which features the ways in which Prevention Research Centers help communities expand access to health care, increase physical activity, decrease substance use and address other health topics in rural America.

Gain insights from entities distinguished by the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) as Heatlh Equity Award Winners.

The findings in this report indicate that disparities in diabetes care exist for Black beneficiaries, dually eligible beneficiaries and those living in higher-poverty areas.

This fact sheet reveals the persistent inequities facing Black Americans, Hispanic Americans and other minority popluations. Lessening such health disparities requires deliberate and sustained efforts to address social determinants of health, such as poverty, segregation, environmental degradation and racial discrimination.

This cross-sectional study finds that Black or Hispanic Medicare fee-for-service patients with ischemic stroke had a higher likelihood of worse stroke severity after being admitted to an acute care facililty.

Is your organization or facility interested in implementing a mental health program in a rural community? The Rural Health Information Hub has created an easy-to-use online toolkit that lists links to seven modules to watch to learn how to implement a mental health program along with links to additional resources.

The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services' (CMS) Office of Minority Health has released a new resource of health equity-related data definitions, standards and stratification practices. This resource clarifies differences in results that may arise when different data standards and definitions are used. Health care providers, states, community organizations, researchers, and others collecting and/or stratifying their health equity-related data can make use of this resource to align with CMS.

This study's findings indicate that, even among the highest-quality hospitals, dually-eligible Medicare patients had poorer health outcomes, but higher costs than other Medicare populations.

How do you know if you may be prejudiced against a certain group or person? This article from May 30, 2024, in Tech Target, explores implicit bias and how health care professionals can incorporate training for all clinical and administrative staff in their organization, facility or practice to help make everyone aware of what implicit bias is and how to work to overcome it to provide the best care to all patients.

This May 16, 2024, blog post from the Milbank Memorial Fund describes real-life scenarios where patients who did not speak English, and who needed crucial conversations with their health care providers, did not have those conversations because there were no health care providers who spoke their language. This blog post highlights the need for health care organizations to invest in professional interpretation services to ensure all patients, regardless of their preferred language, receive the care they deserve.

This brief provides new data on the number of Medicare beneficiaries with dental coverage, the number of beneficiaries who had a dental visit in the past 12 months and out-of-pocket spending on dental care. It also takes a closer look at the scope of dental benefits offered to Medicare Advantage enrollees in individual plans in 2021.

This infographic provides a visual representation of data that reveals the persistent disparities in health and health care for Black people.

This brief examines trends in health coverage by race and ethnicity from 2010 through 2022 and discusses the implications for health disparities.

This article discusses the nuances of health disparities and provides historical context. Additionally, the article delves into the intersectionality among health, socioeconomic status, power and gender.

The article shares the results of a study about the systemic racism BIPOC (Black, Indigenous, and People of Color) experience when seeking long-term services and supports in the United States. The authors offer several recomendations for policy changes that could address this issue.

This report from ATW Solutions provides an overview of data disaggregation. How can disaggregated data help to better identify how health care disparities are experienced in different population groups?

This infographic from the Robert Johnson Wood Foundation differentiates equality from equity. The Robert Johnson Wood Foundation is a collaboration of policymakers, community organizations, and executives who share a common goal to tackle barriers to health, including poverty, power dynamics and discrimination.

The article explores the connection between social disadvantage and low health literacy (LHL) and examines how LHL is an explanatory factor linking social disadvantage, health outcomes, and health disparities.

This article examines the emphasis on health equity amid public health crises and social injustices. Among other things, the authors propose a framework to distinguish between health equity and health care equity and suggest three criteria to use when determining which health care inequities are measurable, linked to health care outcomes and can be used by health care organizations. Note: You must subscribe to read the article.

The 2023 edition of the National Healthcare Quality and Disparities Report, from the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality, assesses the effectiveness of health care systems in providing safe, high-quality and equitable care.

In its first health equity report, RUSH, a prominent academic health system, provides a snapshot of patient data that helped them identify health equity gaps and opportunities. Rush is located in Chicago, IL and serves a diverse patient population.

This resource from the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services offers a table of suggested definitions, standards and stratification practices for nine health equity-related data elements, as well as several frequently asked questions on the purpose and usage of the document. It may also clarify differences in results that may arise when different data standards and definitions are used.

This report, released in 2024 from the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services' Office of Minority Health, provides a summary of the quality of health care people enrolled in Medicare Advantage received across the United States the year prior, focusing on differences in patient experience and clinical care quality based on race, ethnicity and sex.

Here are quick, accessible resources to validate community demographic data. Use these links to validate that REAL data your organization has collected aligns with your community data.

Use this tool to validate that REAL data your organization has collected aligns with your community data.

ATW’s REAL Data Collection Analysis Template helps health care organizations examine the completeness of their race, ethnicity, and language (REAL) data and uncover potential areas of improvement.

This video provides instructions on how to use the ATW’s REAL Data Collection Analysis Template.

Visit the National Minority Heallth Month website to explore resources created for the April 2024 conference. The theme: Be the Source for Better Health: Improving Health Outcomes Through Our Cultures, Communities, and Connections.

In this report, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) describes the current state of enrollee-focused health equity data across CMS programs. The report also describes with the progress made to date and the future actions that will achieve CMS’s vision for health equity.

Visit this webpage from the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services' Health Equity Technical Assistance program to find resources that can help health care organizations take action against health disparities.

Strategic collaboration allows rural organizations to combine resources and expertise to improve care and patient outcomes. This article shares the story of a strategic collaboration that surveyed community health needs assessments, provided technical assistance to community health centers and connected patients to food and housing, and much more.

This editorial provides an overview of rural health disparities and the healthcare needs of rural communities. The article discusses ways in which technology and artificial intelligence may offer needed services. Presents models and infrastructure necessary to implement improvements.

The Think Cultural Health (TCH) newsletter raises awareness of culturally and linguistically appropriate services (CLAS) in health and health care.

Self-care interventions have the potential to strengthen traditional health care systems, improving outcomes for women and other underserved populations.

Community health worker (CHW) programs may improve health outcomes, increase quality of life, reduce hospitalizations and cost of care. However, knowledge is limited on how to scale evidence-based CHW programs to maximize their public health outcomes.

This article describes a protocol that can help researchers select and implement Social Determinants of Health (SDoH) measures for use in research studies. The availability of recommended measurement protocols for SDoH will enable investigators to consistently collect data for SDoH constructs.

This article explains why the Chief Health Equity Officer is becoming a crucial voice in how health care workers understand and mitigate health disparities. This role blurs traditional health care spheres of influence and boundaries of hierarchies and silos.

Project 2VIDA! is a multidisciplinary collaborative of academic researchers, community members and clinicians who want to foster partnerships to reduce the burden of COVID-19 in Hispanic and Black communities across Southern California. This article explores how the collaborative was received by community members.

In this recorded webinar, subject-matter experts from ATW Health Solutions discuss the National Standards for Culturally and Linguistically Appropriate Services in Health and Health Care (National CLAS Standards). Among other things, participants learned how to develop a plan for implementing CLAS and get leadership support for that plan.

This document answers frequently asked questions about billing codes for health care services that address the health-related social needs of Medicare beneficiaries.

This report from the Texas Health Institute presents research findings that support recommendations for advaincing oral health equity in Texas.

This report highlights how bolstering the civic infrastructure can help minimize structural barriers like policies, laws and practices that can create obstacles to social and economic opportunities for good health.

As this article reports, the medical community is increasingly recognizing how Social Determinants of Health (SDoH) can lead to health inequity. Indeed, SDoH are becoming a critical factor in payer and provider conversations about better managing health.

This guide, published by ATW Health Solutions, provides an overview of the National CLAS Standards.

This intervention list, published by ATW Health Solutions, interventions that support Culturally and Linguistically Appropriate Services (CLAS).

This guide published by ATW Health Solutions, provides an in-depth overview of Theme 1 of the National CLAS Standards.

This guide, published by ATW Health Solutions, provides an in-depth overview of Theme 3 of the National CLAS Standards.

This guide presents a comparison of Theme 1 of the National CLAS Standards with those from the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services, The Joint Commission and state regulations for long-term care facilities.

This intervention list, published by ATW Health Solutions, provides interventions that support Theme 2 of the Culturally and Linguistically Appropriate Services (CLAS).

This guide published by ATW Health Solutions, provides an in-depth overview of Theme 2 of the National CLAS Standards.

This intervention list published by ATW Health Solutions, provides interventions that support Theme 3 of the Culturally and Linguistically Appropriate Services (CLAS).

This guide presents a comparison of Theme 2 of the National CLAS Standards with those from the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services, The Joint Commission and state regulations for long-term care facilities.

This guide presents a comparison of Theme 3 of the National CLAS Standards with those from the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services, The Joint Commission and state regulations for long-term care facilities.

This crosswalk aligns three sets of standards with the Culturally and Linguistically Appropriate Services (CLAS) Standards: the Joint Commission health equity standards, Centers for Medicare & Medicaid health equity measures, and existing Appendix PP long-term care regulations. Facilities can use this guide to evaluate existing efforts to achieve health equity and help determine new opportunities to advance health equity.

This guide from the American Hospital Association (AHA) describes the link between food insecurity and adverse health issues and outlines clinical and nonclinical approaches that hospitals and health systems can use to reduce food insecurity and the stigma often associated with it.

This webpage provides information on the causes and effects of food insecurity, ways to take action to provide food security and how to find food banks.

This Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) webpage provides answers to commonly asked questions regarding elder abuse—what it is, scale of the issue, possible consequences and how to prevent.

The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) announced it is finalizing policies to support primary care, advance health equity, assist family caregivers and expand access to behavioral and certain oral health care.

The University of Wisconsin Population Health Institute developed the County Health Rankings & Roadmaps website to give the majority of counties in the United States the data to help improve health equity in their communities. The data provides a snapshot of how health is influenced by where we live, learn, work and play.

Health equity is a central focus of the Healthy People initiative. Healthy People 2030 offers tools and resources to support efforts to advance health equity and now features disparities data for many objectives. Health care providers and others can track changes in health disparities, over time, to see where the nation is improving and where increasing health equity efforts need to be improved.

Intimate partner violence (IPV) is abuse or aggression that occurs in a romantic relationship. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), IPV is related to serious health issues. This CDC website can help health care workers better understand IPV, and how they can help prevent it.

Child abuse and neglect are serious public health problems. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) maintains this website so health care workers can better understand chlild abuse and neglect. This CDC website also provides evidence-based strategies that can help health care workers prevent child abuse and neglect.

Elder abuse occurs when an older adult experiences an act that causes them harm. Abuse, including neglect and exploitation, is experienced by about 1 in 10 people, aged 60 and older, who live at home. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) maintains a website that can help health care workers better understand elder abuse. This CDC website also offers evidence-based strategies that can help health care workers prevent elder abuse.

To treat patients’ social needs, we must first identify those needs. The American Hospital Association created this guide to help hospital-based health care providers, patients and community stakeholders determine how to screen and identify the socioeconomic challenges some people may face.

This whitepaper from TMF Health Quality Institute describes key social determinants of health (SDOH) and how they affect health outcomes. The whitepaper includes examples of how provider organizations and hospitals and community-based stakeholders can work together to address SDOH.

This article discusses ways to improve patient transfers from one facility to another. Effective transfers helps ensure that all patients have access to quality care.

This article, from Optum.com, explores how commercial Medicare Advantage insurance plans can address social determinants of health (SDOH), just as Medicare or Medicaid do. According to Optum.com, addressing SDOH requires an evolution in coding capabilities within existing documentation systems.

The American Hospital Association shares these videos to help hospital-based health care providers explore ways to address the social determinants of health that directly affect their patients' wellbeing.

The Social Determinants of Health (SDOH) website, maintained by the American Hospital Association (AHA), houses reports and case studies, along with webinars and videos, on several SDOH characteristics. The AHA website also links to resources hospitals can use to better meet their community's needs while addressing health care disparities.

Where and how people live directly affects their heath. People experiencing housing instability have limited access to preventive care and are more likely to have infectious diseases and chronic health conditions. This website, maintained by the American Hospital Association, shares resources to help hospital workers better understand how housing instability affects health, and what they can do to ensure that people in their communities have access to affordable, stable housing.

People who do not have reliable transportation may find it difficult to access health care, which results in missed or delayed access to preventive health care services. This website, maintained by the American Hospital Association, shares resources to help hospital workers better understand how transportation issues affect health and health care outcomes, and what they can do to reduce transportation barriers in their communities.

The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services has created a new state total cost-of-care model designed to enhance multi-payer alignment. The AHEAD Model has several goals: to collaborate with states to curb health care cost growth, improve population health and reduce disparities in health outcomes.

A new analysis of health and nutrition, conducted by a team from the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center, shows that social determinants of health (SDOH) significantly influence heart failure outcomes for people of color. The study also shows that patients with incomes below the federal poverty level face more challenges to overcome within the different categories of SDOH.

The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services offers a 4-minute, animated video that explains when a proxy response is allowed for Social Determinants of Health items.

This checklist, from the Eastern U.S. Quality Improvement Collaborative (EQIC), can help hospital staff assess how well the hospital has incorporated health equity best practices in its operations.

Pharmacists at the Pharmacy Quality Alliance (PQA) 2023 Annual Meeting discussed the role of data collection and analysis in the movement toward health equity. Panelists emphasized that a variety of data needs to be collected, including race, ethnicity, language, SDOH, geography, disabilities, sexual orientation and gender identification information. All of these factors play a role in narrowing the gaps in health care.

The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) Center for Medicare and Medicaid Innovation (CMMI) continues to work toward achieving health equity in testing its payment and service delivery models. This article describe future CMMI efforts, which includes developing new models and revising existing models to promote and incentivize equitable care and increasing its collection and analysis of equity data.

Chronic diseases pose a significant problem in the United States resulting in substantial morbidity, mortality, disability and cost. The CMS Office of Minority Health has designed an interactive map, the Mapping Medicare Disparities (MMD) Tool, to identify areas of disparities between subgroups of Medicare enrollees (e.g., racial and ethnic groups) in health outcomes, utilization and spending.

The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid's health equity strategy will build on the Biden-Harris Administration's commitment to advancing racial equity and support for underserved communities through the federal government, as described in President Biden's Executive Orders 13985 and 14091.

The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) released an updated framework to further advance health equity, expand coverage and improve health outcomes for the more than 170 million individuals supported by CMS programs.

In this strategic plan, the National Institutes of Health explains how it hopes to grow and sustain diversity, equity, inclusion and accessibility (DEIA) across all of the agency's activities. The strategic plan has three objectives: enhancing DEIA through structural and cultural change; implementing organizational practices to center and prioritize DEIA in the biomedical and behavioral research workforce and advancing DEIA through research.

QIN-QIOs will help providers develop a CLAS implementation action plan using the "An Implementation Checklist for the National CLAS Standards" checklist, developed by the U.S. Health and Human Services department.See pages 4-8.

This self-directed training course is designed for physicians, physician assistants, and nurse practitioners. With growing concerns about racial and ethnic disparities in health and about the need for health care systems to accommodate increasingly diverse patient populations, cultural competence is a matter of national concern. This e-learning program will equip health care providers with competencies that will enable them to better treat the increasingly diverse U.S. population.

The CMS Office of Minority Health offers a comprehensive source of information on eliminating health disparities and improving the health of all minority populations, like racial and ethnic minorities, people with disabilities, members of the lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender community, individuals with limited English proficiency, and rural populations.

This toolkit can enable organizations to implement the National CLAS Standards and improve health equity.

This website, from the U.S. Department of Health & Human Services, promotes education, continuing education opportunities, and resources to learn about culturally and linguistically appropriate services (CLAS).

This website connects you to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) resources for social determinants of health (SDOH) data, research, tools for action, programs and policy. They may be used by people in public health, community organizations, research organizations, and health care systems to assess SDOH and improve community well-being.

The Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality's SHARE Approach is a five-step process for shared decision-making that includes comparing the benefits, harms and risks of each option through meaningful patient-provider dialogue.