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Making Progress on Health Care Disparities
Contact: Cheryl Pedersen, (609) 275-2258
PRINCETON, N.J. (June 12, 2009)—Racial and ethnic minority groups confront disparities in the quality of health care that contribute to higher rates of disease, disability, and mortality. A new report from Mathematica Policy Research, Inc., describes National Health Plan Collaborative (NHPC) efforts to help large national and regional health plans team up to reduce these disparities. Sponsored by the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ) and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, the collaborative began in July 2004 as a forum for health plans to better understand disparities, share strategies and best practices for measuring them, and develop interventions.
Mathematica’s evaluation assessed NHPC’s ability to encourage and support health plans’ leadership in championing work on disparities. It also assessed plans’ ability to collect data to better identify potential disparities, develop and pilot interventions, and communicate outcomes.
The NHPC initially emphasized collaboration to encourage participating health plans—and indirectly the insurance industry—to consider creative approaches to measuring and reducing disparities. In the second phase, plans focused on collecting primary data on members’ race and ethnicity, and on providing translation services to those with limited English proficiency. Most participating plans made substantial progress in integrating and institutionalizing their disparities work into the mainstream of their organizations. The collaborative also produced a toolkit of resources, lessons, case studies, and videos to help other health plans identify and reduce disparities within their memberships.
Despite the strides plans made in disparities measurement and reduction, significant challenges lie ahead. The current economic recession may hamper work on disparities as other issues and concerns move to the forefront. In addition, most employers—the primary purchases of commercial health coverage—are not attuned to issues of health care disparities. In the current economic climate, a key focus will likely be the potential for reductions in disparities to improve health care quality while reducing cost.
"The NHPC has helped plans become more committed to work on disparities and modify their organizational structures to institutionalize these concerns,” said Erin Fries Taylor, co-author of the report and an associate director and senior researcher at Mathematica. "The NHPC has generated knowledge, commitments, and channels of communication that will provide a valuable basis for building future work on disparities.”
“The National Health Plan Collaborative: Overview of Its Origins, Accomplishments, and Lessons Learned,” by Taylor and Marsha Gold is available at www.mathematica-mpr.com/publications/pdfs/Health/NHPC_overview.pdf. AHRQ funded Mathematica’s evaluation of the second phase of the NHPC. AHRQ funded Mathematica’s evaluation of the second phase of the NHPC.
Mathematica, a nonpartisan research firm, conducts high-quality, objective policy research and surveys to improve public well-being. Its clients include federal and state governments, foundations, and private-sector and international organizations. The employee-owned company, with offices in Princeton, N.J., Ann Arbor, Mich., Cambridge, Mass., Chicago, Ill., Oakland, Calif., and Washington, D.C., has conducted some of the most important studies of health care, education, family support, employment, nutrition, and early childhood policies and programs.