Population Health Management Program (PHM)
As most hospitals know, chronically ill patients generate about three-quarters of all health costs. The debate over healthcare reform has highlighted the shortcomings of our healthcare system and the controversy continues with Obamacare. To create a sustainable healthcare system that provides affordable, high-quality healthcare to all, one approach is to adopt a population health management (PMH) program. PMH has been defined in the article “What is population health?” American Journal of Public Health March 2003 edition as: "the health outcomes of a group of individuals, including the distribution of such outcomes within the group".
The idea is if you treat the causes of the poor health, it will improve our health and the healthcare services. Some of the ideas are addressing poor nutrition, physical inactivity, and substance abuse at an individual’s level or a population/group of people to help the entire human population. If you start with people who have little or no risk, then you can prevent a lot of the issues from ever surfacing. If you treat someone who is at moderate or high risk, they need to be addressed differently with the goal of them not getting worse than they currently are or developing into other problems.
You would start with a Health and Wellness promotion for those with little or no risk. You would work on Risk Management and Care Coordination/Advocacy if they are moderate risk, and finally if the person is a high risk then you would focus on the Disease or Case Management. Tracking this should be fairly simple with all the EMR technology that hospitals have or are getting.
For more in depth information, Healthy People 2020 (a web site sponsored by the US Department of Health and Human Services), identifies 42 topics considered Social determinants of health and approximately 1200 specific goals considered to improve population health. Check it out at http://www.healthypeople.gov/2020/topicsobjectives2020/overview.aspx?topicid=39
According to the website, these five key areas (determinants) that affect your health include:
Economic Stability
Education
Social and Community Context
Health and Health Care
Neighborhood and Built Environment
By focusing on your key areas and customizing the plan to fit where you are and what is affecting you based on the items above, the healthcare industry feels they can change your health history for the better and remove or lower your risks for health problems in the future.