New York State, as part of its Medicaid Section 1115 Demonstration Waiver, seeks to integrate health and social care through newly created networks. The $500 million program is one component of a three-year, $7.5 billion waiver with nearly $6 billion in federal funding.
Syracuse-based health information exchange HealtheConnections is partnering with three social care networks (SCNs) in the Hudson Valley, Southern Tier, and Central New York regions to address health-related social needs (HRSNs) : Hudson Valley Care Coalition, Care Compass Network. and Healthy Alliance. Each of these SCNs have engaged UniteUs, a social care coordination company, to host their HRSN screening and referral platform for streamlined coordination and effective data collection.
Working with the New York eHealth Collaborative (NYeC) and the other five qualified entities of the Statewide Health Information Network for New York (SHIN-NY), HealtheConnections engages in coordinated efforts to exchange HRSN data between SCNs and SHIN-NY data. lake.
Using synthetic data, HealtheConnections and its SHIN-NY partners recently completed a testing phase to establish reliable processes for seamless data flow between SCNs and the SHIN-NY data lake. The next phase will be to work directly with the three SCNs and UniteU to exchange their HRSN data.
HealtheConnections said it will also work with outpatient and hospital practices within its service area to collect data from HRSN screening tests performed within their systems. All HRSN data collected through these efforts will be accessible through the HealtheConnections platform for queries, which should allow for more complete information for care providers without the need for additional tools or systems.
The HealtheConnections health information exchange covers 26 counties in New York State and surrounding states, supporting more than 11,000 physicians and the millions of patients they serve.
The Medicaid waiver program will seek to address health disparities in low-income communities by leveraging federal funds to facilitate Medicaid members’ access to nutritious meals, housing supports, transportation and other social services. By integrating social care and health care, this program advances a key initiative under the New York Health Equity Reform (NYHER) waiver amendment.
SCNs will be instrumental in facilitating the meeting of health-related social needs, including nutrition, housing supports, transportation, and case management for eligible Medicaid members, with the goal of addressing health disparities and improve the health of the population.
Among their other goals, SCNs will seek to create a more accessible customer experience for Medicaid members seeking HRSN services through social care navigation and closed-loop referrals. They also plan to build the capacity of community-based organizations (CBOs) to provide high-quality HRSN services and manage new or increased administrative responsibilities through capacity development and reliable funding streams.
