NEJM Perspective: How Hospitals Can Act On Health Equity Data

In a recent announcement, the US Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) added three measures to the Hospital Inpatient Quality Reporting program that are intended to promote health equity efforts. These measures will rate hospitals on the degree to which they prioritize health equity, how they collect sociodemographic information and health-related social needs (HSRNs), the percentage of patients screened for HSRNs, and more.

According to the authors, “Hospitals will probably require new capabilities and planning to successfully screen for HRSNs, but there’s limited evidence to inform approaches to inpatient screening. Research on the acceptability of screening among patients and providers and the validity and reliability of specific tools has been primarily conducted in outpatient settings. A recent report found that only 2 of 42 implementation studies related to multidomain HRSN screening were conducted in inpatient settings. Nonetheless, there are several steps that hospitals could take to support the adoption of these measures.”

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(Source: NEJM, December 24^th, 2022)