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Health Equity

Health Care Equity Committee Charter

DEFINITIONS

Health Care Disparities: Preventable differences in the burden of disease, injury, violence, or opportunities to achieve optimal health that are experienced by socially disadvantaged populations.

Health Equity: A state in which every person can achieve their full health potential, and in which no person is prevented from achieving this potential because of socially determined circumstances.

Social Determinants of Health (SDH): Conditions in the environments where people are born, live, learn, work, play, worship, and age that affect a wide range of health, functioning, and quality-of-life outcomes and risks.

Health-Related Social Needs (HRSNs): Health-harming conditions often identified as root causes of disparities in health outcomes. Examples:

  1. Food Insecurity
  2. Housing Instability
  3. Transportation Challenges
  4. Education and Literacy
  5. Difficulty Paying for Prescriptions and Medical Bills

ROLE

Health Care Equity, as required by CMS, is TBHC’s strategic priority.

The role of this Committee shall be to ensure leadership engagement and hospital commitment to Equity, ensure appropriate data collection, data analysis and quality improvement.

AUTHORITY

The Health Care Equity Committee shall have the authority to establish policies and procedures to ensure compliance with The Joint Commission National Patient Safety Goal Standard NPSG 16.01.01 and CMS Inpatient Quality Reporting requirements.

SCOPE

Populations served will include hospital inpatients, emergency patients, ambulatory care and detox patients.

RESPONSIBILITIES

The Health Care Equity Committee shall:

  • Plan, organize, and lead all activities related to the hospital’s health care equity initiatives.
  • Establish processes for the following:
    • Collecting information about patients’ Health Related Social Needs (HRSN)/Social Determinants of Health (SDH) and report to external agencies, such as CMS, as needed.
    • Providing patients with information about internal and external resources and support services that address their HRSNs/SDHs.
    • Identifying health care disparities in the hospital’s patient population.
    • Developing not less than one written action plan to address identified health care disparities.
    • Monitoring performance related to health care equity action plans and respond when goal(s) are not met or sustained.
  • Identify internal and external stakeholders to serve as resources and partners in the health care equity program and its activities, including but not limited to the following:
    • Hospital leaders, managers, and staff members
    • Relevant community organizations
    • Relevant government agencies
  • Communicate with internal and external partners and stakeholders about the health care equity program and its activities and progress in reducing identified health care disparities, as appropriate.

STRUCTURE

The membership of the Health Equity Committee shall be composed of the Chief Equity Officer, Chief Medical and Information Officer, Chief NurseExecutive, Sr. Director Quality Management/Sr. Director Patient Safety & PI, AVP Ambulatory Care, IT Analyst, Director of Social Work, Director of Case Management, members of the community/patient advocates and representatives from the clinical areas as needed.

During the initial year of inception, the Committee shall meet at least four (4) times a year in a calendar year.

AGENDA

The agenda of the Committee meetings shall consistently include the following topics for discussion:

  1. Demographic Data Collection
  2. Screening Data for Social Drivers of Health (SDH)/Health Related Social Needs (HRSN)
  3. Quality and Patient Safety outcome data stratification
  4. Action planning based on data stratification
  5. Performance related to health equity action plan