Report: Addressing social needs key to improving health outcomes

A new report from the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine recommends actions for health care systems, government agencies and others to better integrate patients’ social needs into health care delivery. For example, the report recommends health care providers make an organizational commitment to addressing health-related social needs and disparities in individual and population health, and identify the most effective ways to assess and document social needs. The report also recommends the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services define which aspects of social care Medicaid can cover, and make the opportunities and limitations clear to health plans and health care and social care service providers. It also calls for a national vision and defined technology standards for integrating health care and social care data, and for the Department of Health and Human Services to work with the private sector to disseminate educational tools and guidance on data security and privacy when collecting and sharing personally identifiable information.
 
“Integrating social care into health care delivery can be transformative for addressing the individual needs of patients and the collective needs of communities,” said Kirsten Bibbins-Domingo, vice dean for population health and health equity at the University of California, San Francisco, and chair of the committee that wrote the report. “However, we need the workforce, financing, and infrastructure to do this effectively.”