3 ways that population health is a game-changer

You’ve heard how population health management will play a central role in reimagining care delivery; today, I’m going to predict the three ways it will be game changing.

1. Population Health has the potential to eradicate society’s health inequalities

True healthcare transformation will come when we address the social determinants of health: the social, physical, political and economic factors that influence a person’s health. Experts – such as David Nash, MD, MBA, Dean of the Jefferson College of Public Health –  believe, for example, that a person’s zip code is their number one health predictor.

We are already seeing healthcare organizations asking vendors to incorporate social determinants of health risk data into patient records. Looking ahead, technology will enable us to analyze people within a group (e.g. a zip code) and use the data to determine ways to improve their care coordination and delivery and, ultimately, their health.

2. Population Health will prove that data can make doctors better at their jobs

The more that we collect and analyze data, the more insights we can generate, enabling doctors, care givers and individuals to make the right decisions and take the right actions. Predictive analytics, genomics, precision medicine – there are so many areas of medicine where data is helping practitioners achieve breakthroughs. Population health management is already impacting the manner in which care is being provided and, I believe, when we reach the tipping point where value-based care is accepted as the norm, that’s when we will see widespread acceptance that data can help doctors do what they do best – and better it.  

3. Population Health will unlock health prevention

Right now, PHM is successfully being used to better manage the most chronic patient populations: those 20% whose complex chronic care needs account for around 80% of the costs. But we know that, if we are to successfully evolve from our reactive “sick care society” to one that actively manages and prolongs health, then we need to throw our population health arsenal at keeping people out of the system to begin with.