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Participants review how metrics can drive health care sector toward better alignment with other sectors
On the third day of Building Healthy Communities: The Role of Hospitals, participants considered the use of metrics to drive the health care sector toward better alignment with other sectors and broader accountability to communities in support of population health.
Tracey Cooper, chief executive of Public Health Wales, began the discussion by informing participants about the Well-being of Future Generations Act, a piece of legislation passed in Wales in 2015. Its intention is to help improve the country’s economic, social, environmental and cultural well-being.
As one of several public bodies listed on the Act, Public Health Wales is expected to work toward achieving seven well-being goals. In the Act, a sustainable development principle exists which asks organizations to bear in mind the future when making decisions.
Cooper explained how she and others looked at the return of investment particular actions would lead to. When presenting this information to others, Cooper said the “reality landed.”
Anna Matheson, senior lecturer in public health at Massey University, said her interest was exploring health inequalities. She questioned whether long-term monitoring of aspects of community organizations was required. Matheson demonstrated the usefulness of case study methods for understanding social complexities.
She said it should be recognized that there are pre-existing relationships and activities going on within communities. The sensemaking process has been a useful way of taking data back to the community.
Patricia Frenz, director of the School of Public Health at the University of Chile, said metrics were about good data, valid indicators, and meaningful indexes. The starting point is people having a shared vision and an understanding of what dimensions need to be measured and interpreted.
In Chile, one of the concerns is the number of people who are invisible to the health system and don’t benefit from available services. Frenz said Chile had participation mechanisms in place to ensure the communities are identifying their needs and are involved in the health system.
Mahmood Adil, medical director at the NHS National Services Scotland, said every country has a different way of collecting and using data. The Scottish Index of Multiple Deprivation locates concentrations of deprived areas across Scotland and helps authorities collect data on the social determinants of health. Specialist intelligence teams are in place to help authorities interpret this data.
Adil said people needed to find ways to share knowledge on the challenges everyone faces. That said, he warned people should remember there is someone’s life behind data and the process needed to be humanized.
The session, Building Healthy Communities: The Role of Hospitals is part of Salzburg Global Seminar multi-year series Health and Health Care Innovation in the 21st Century. This year’s session is held in partnership with the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. To keep up to date with the conversations taking place during the session, follow #SGShealth on Twitter and Instagram.