Awareness of SDoH value rising, but not on providers’ radars
But the majority said their organizations were not prepared to take advantage of the currently existing data on such factors.
The medical profession, perhaps driven by Dr. Gregory House’s home visits on the TV show House, has awakened to the value of social determinants of health (SDoH) in treating patients. Sadly, says a recent survey, most providers have at best a primitive ability to capture and integrate this information into their health care delivery systems.
The study, presented by Morning Consult via Innovaccer, was based on interviews with 75 executives at health systems teams and facilities with up to 2,000 beds, and revenue ranging from less than $1 billion to $10 billion plus. The researchers’ primary objective was to gauge how prepared major providers are to move from fee-based to value-based health care/billing. (They think they are more prepared than they actually are, the study concludes.)
But the lack of integration of SDoH data was among the nuggets from the study. Those interviewed were clearly aware of the significance of occupation, shelter, diet, social-economic background, and the other major SDoH factors. But the majority said their organizations were not prepared to take advantage of the currently existing data on such factors. And the outlook was bleak for harnessing the coming flood of SDoH data to provide better health care.
The critical importance of capturing, evaluating, and integrating SDoH into the care continuum cannot be understated. Morning Consult notes that other research indicates that “80% of the factors that influence health outcomes occur outside the walls of hospitals and clinics,” and that “social factors account for 25% to 60%” of U.S. deaths each year.
Here’s what the system heavy hitters told Morning Consult on the subject of SDoH:
Organizations want data-driven SDoH insights. They are currently giving priority to data on substance abuse, language barriers, health literacy, geography, and income/transportation, in that order. So their priorities aren’t in bad shape.
But nearly 7 of 10 are not deploying technology that would identify at-risk patients via SDoH, and about the same number aren’t integrating medical and social data. Instead, they still depend upon information shared between provider and patient to check off these boxes, “and most are not focused on the technology needed to capture and use SDoH.”
For instance:
- About half say theory planned to deploy “error-prone manual processes at the point of care” to gather the data.
- About a third say they’ll invest in software to mine SDoH data to identify at-risk patients.
- Only 28% say they plan to integrate medical and social data.
- 83% exhibit a decided unreadiness “to capture and act on consumer-generated data” from wearables and other personal use technology.
The upshot: the tsunami of SDoH data that is about to slam into our health care providers will do more damage than good given the poor state of preparedness this study identified.
Related: Commercial health plan policies delay patient care, increase burnout: AHA
“The key to value-based care is the ability to integrate data from EHRs and other IT silos — clinical, claims, labs, pharmacy, telehealth, remote monitoring, social determinants, consumer generated, you name it — into a unified patient record that lets providers understand, report on, and foster the analytics-driven workflows, care management, risk stratification, and patient engagement strategies that drive better outcomes at lower costs, and meet contracted performance targets,” the report says.
But that integration, according to the findings, may elude providers for years to come unless they step up their digital investments to take advantage of data that is already available – and would greatly improve health outcomes.