POPULATION HEALTH MANAGEMENT · SOCIAL DETERMINANTS OF HEALTH


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Work on Social Drivers of Health The pandemic has been a catalyst for CMS and state Medicaid agencies using healthcare dollars to address issues such as housing, transportation, interpersonal violence, and food insecurity By David Raths


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t the beginning of 2020, many state Medicaid agencies were beginning to explore ways to address social


drivers of health through managed care contracts. Almost three years later, driven by the impact of the pandemic, even more states have decided that the key to improving health outcomes and limiting cost growth is to use healthcare dollars to address issues such as housing, transportation, interpersonal violence and food insecurity. Manatt Health surveyed state Medicaid


programs about their efforts to address social drivers through managed health both in 2020 and again in 2022. “What we found is that the pandemic has really been a catalyst of sorts to caring for the whole person,” says Mandy Ferguson, M.P.H, a senior manager in Manatt Health’s Washington, D.C., offi ce. “We saw this movement in 2020, but the progress was


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really slow,” she adds. “States were doing one or two things, and some states were doing nothing. And in the refresh of the survey in 2022, we found all kinds of trends — the most notable one is that addressing drivers of health is really commonplace now. The overwhelming majority of states are focused on integrating requirements to address drivers of health into existing care management obligations — things like screening for social needs, referring


members to social services, and connect- ing members to other federal and state programs like SNAP and WIC.” Of the 15 states that Manatt Health


looked at in its 2022 survey, every single one had housing-related requirements in their managed care contracts. “Housing and food always tend to be at the top of the list. There’s a lot of good evidence that they can actually help improve health out- comes and reduce healthcare utilization


“Addressing drivers of health is really commonplace now. The overwhelming majority of states are focused on integrating requirements to address drivers of health into existing care management obligations.” —Mandy Ferguson, M.P.H.


10 hcinnovationgroup.com | NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2022


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