7th week disc

What do we mean by Population Health?

-How has the Affordable Care Act impacted Population Health and what is the relationship of Population Health to  Accountable Care Organizations and Primary Care Medical Homes?

-Provide a link to an article and discuss how health plans, hospitals, and physicians are implementing the concept of population health, including valued based reimbursement (medical outcomes) vs.. traditional reimbursement  (volumes of visits and procedures) for both individual patients and a defined population.

Example on how much to write!!!!! Do not use!!

· -What do we mean by Population Health?

Population health is defined as “the health outcomes of a group of individuals, including the distribution of such outcomes within the group” (Improving Population Health). The goal of population health is to improve health outcomes (Stoto). In addition the term “total population health” is “defined by geographic areas” (Stoto).

-How has the Affordable Care Act impacted Population Health and what is the relationship of Population Health to Accountable Care Organizations and Primary Care Medical Homes?

The ACA affects population health in four ways. The first way being, “provisions to expand insurance coverage and aim to improve population health by improving access to the health care delivery system” (Stoto). Secondly, other provisions aim to improve quality of care delivered. Thirdly, “less well-known provisions of the ACA seek to enhance prevention and health promotion measures within the health care delivery system” (Stoto). The final way the ACA affects population health is a set of provisions that “aims at promoting community and population-based activities, including the establishment of the National Prevention, Health Promotion and Public Health Council, which has already produced the mandated National Prevention Strategy (DHHS 2011) as well as a new Prevention and Public Health Fund (authorized at $1 billion in fiscal year 2012) and funding for Community Transformation Grants” (Stoto).

The relationship of Population Health to Accountable Care organizations is because ACO’s are investing in improving population health.

-Provide a link to an article and discuss how health plans, hospitals, and physicians are implementing the concept of population health, including valued based reimbursement (medical outcomes) vs.. traditional reimbursement  (volumes of visits and procedures) for both individual patients and a defined population.