Population Health In Challenging Times
The year 2020 presented extraordinary challenges to organizations working to improve population health. As a means of understanding how various domains in the population health field are responding to and being changed by two major crises (racial injustice and the COVID-19 pandemic), the Roundtable on Population Health Improvement of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine held a workshop on September 21-24, 2020, titled Population Health in Challenging Times: Insights from Key Domains. The workshop had sessions organized by themes, such as academic public health and population health; health care; and governmental public health. Each panel discussion highlighted difficulties and opportunities, both internal to the respective institutions and sectors, and at the interface with peers and partners, especially communities. A publication that summarizes the presentations and panel discussions from the workshop can be obtained here.
New Platforms Of Health Care
For the past century, health care measurement and delivery have been centered in hospitals and clinics. That arrangement is beginning to change as health measures and increasingly care delivery are migrating to homes and mobile devices. The COVID-19 pandemic has only accelerated this transition. While increasing access to care and improving convenience, this move toward platforms operated by for-profit firms raises concerns about privacy, equity, and duty that will have to be addressed. Also, this change in measuring health and delivering health care will create opportunities for educators to expand the settings for training, researchers to conduct studies at enormous scale, payors to embrace lower-cost clinical settings, and patients to make their voices heard. An article published on July 15, 2021 in npj Digital Medicine can be obtained here.
Geriatric Emergency Department Accreditation Program In The United States
Rapid growth in geriatric emergency departments (EDs) has been driven by Level 3 accreditation. Most geriatric EDs are in urban areas, indicating the potential need for expansion beyond those locations. Future research evaluating the impact of GEDA on health care utilization and patient-oriented outcomes is needed. The results of a recent study were published on August 10, 2021 in the journal Annals of Emergency Medicine. The objectives of this research were to describe the reach and adoption of Geriatric Emergency Department Accreditation (GEDA) program and care processes instituted at accredited geriatric emergency departments (EDs). Investigators analyzed a cross-section of a cohort of 225 EDs in the U.S. that received GEDA from May 2018 to March 2021. Only nine geriatric EDs were in rural regions. Significant heterogeneity existed in protocols enacted at geriatric EDs; minimizing urinary catheter use and fall prevention were the most common. The article can be obtained here.
Financial Impact of COVID-19 On Older Adults
A survey conducted by the Commonwealth Fund between March and June 2021 reveals that nearly one in five older Americans, particularly older Black and Latino/Hispanic Americans, indicate that they used up their savings or lost their main source of income because of the COVID-19 pandemic, a rate several times higher than in other high-income countries. The results of the study can be obtained here.