Medical Economics Inside the Practice: Inside New Ways to Address Social Drivers of Health

Leaders within the U.S. Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services have proposed the new Universal Foundation, a core set of quality measures that align across programs currently using various criteria to assess physicians, clinicians, and health care settings. The Physicians Foundation believes that federal leadership can become a meaningful – even historic – step forward in changing how doctors, patients, and payers address drivers of health (DOH). Also called social drivers or social determinants of health (SDOH), those factors can range from food insecurity to transportation or utility issues, to interpersonal safety. Physicians Foundation President Gary Price, MD, MBA, explains this connection.