Healthy Alliance and ESU Partnership: Evaluation of a Social Care Network
Over the past 6 years we’ve collaborated with Healthy Alliance, New York State’s leader in creating a novel regional social care network.
Our evaluation partnership initially launched with funding from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, to pursue a quantitative analysis of the impact of this model, and its potential to solve the “wrong pockets” phenomena. From that work we have published a case study: Rosenbaum E, Shaw JG, Wagner TH, Vilendrer S, Winget M, Killikelly C, Olney L, Coletti E, Horan M, Kelly M, Asch SM. Breaking down the barriers between health and social care services: implementing a social determinants of health network. NEJM Catalyst. 2023;4(6):CAT.22.0286. doi:10.1056/CAT.22.0286
Subsequently, Healthy Alliance has received funding under the expansion of the Medicaid Waiver 1115 which has allowed us to continue our collaboration, and pivot our evaluation to explore perspectives of clients and community-based organizations for insight on successful social care.
Partner
Our partner in this work is Healthy Alliance, an independent practice association (IPA) focused on addressing social determinants of health. Healthy Alliance, founded in 2018, serves Medicaid and uninsured clients in 20+ counties in New York State, representing a mix of urban/rural and historically underserved populations. In August of 2024, Healthy Alliance was designated as the Social Care Network (SCN) lead entity for the Capital Region, Central New York, and North Country under New York’s Medicaid 1115 Waiver Program. Healthy Alliance seeks to help those in need by connecting clients to necessary services using culturally sensitive approaches. Healthy Alliance curates and coordinates a mix of social services and health providers, facilitated by a referral and tracking platform, Healthy Together. This platform has a structured intake to identify a client’s risks and needs. It also tracks referrals and whether the person received the service, creating a “closed-loop system” that differentiates the network from “usual care.”
Project 1: Quantitative Analysis of Health and Social Care Use
In our first project together, we leveraged data from the New York Statewide Planning and Research Cooperative System (SPARCS) to understand characteristics of the clients engaged in the Healthy Alliance network, and potential cost impacts on health care use. We explored difference-in-differences analyses comparing clients to matched controls, before and after implementation of Healthy Alliance, to get an estimate of changes in total medical costs. Our team captured significant learnings and shared these in case study in a NEJM Catalyst publication: Rosenbaum E, Shaw JG, Wagner TH, Vilendrer S, Winget M, Killikelly C, Olney L, Coletti E, Horan M, Kelly M, Asch SM. Breaking down the barriers between health and social care services: implementing a social determinants of health network. NEJM Catalyst. 2023;4(6):CAT.22.0286. doi:10.1056/CAT.22.0286
Project 2: Qualitative Evaluation of Community-Based Organizations (CBOs) and Clients
The goal of this project is to engage Medicaid beneficiaries and CBOs in identifying barriers and facilitators to implementation of CBO-based screening, navigation, and delivery of social services through the Section 1115 Waiver in Upstate New York. We will conduct semi-structured qualitative interviews with CBO leaders, staff, and clients/Medicaid beneficiaries paired with community-engaged research methods. Community engagement methods include: community member participation in the research team, community feedback sessions on interim study results, capacity building via qualitative training for local students in NY exploring careers in research, and a final brainstorming session with key stakeholders at state and local levels to operationalize study findings into practice.
For any questions or further information on the qualitative project, please contact Nadia Safaeinili (nadiasaf@stanford.edu).
Featured
Publications
Rosenbaum E, Shaw JG, Wagner TH, Vilendrer S, Winget M, Killikelly C, Olney L, Coletti E, Horan M, Kelly M, Asch SM. Breaking down the barriers between health and social care services: implementing a social determinants of health network. NEJM Catalyst. 2023;4(6):CAT.22.0286. doi:10.1056/CAT.22.0286
