Manatt Health Senior Advisor Natassia Rozario co-authored a blog post for the Milbank Memorial Fund about New Jersey’s Integrated Population Health Data (iPHD) Project, a state-initiated university partnership that aims to improve population health and the cost-effectiveness of state health care programs.
According to the article, the initiative makes use of integrated public administrative data that can help support government with data-driven, cross-sector solutions for addressing social drivers of health. The iPHD governing board identified four initial priorities for the project, including informing the state’s approach to addressing the opioid epidemic; improving maternal and infant health; assuring access to physical and behavioral health services and addressing social determinants of health; and supporting the state’s response to COVID-19 and other public health emergencies.
The iPHD legislation also utilizes a university partnership with the Rutgers Center who will receive, integrate, and manage pertinent administrative data and support the board and the research application process. “As the iPHD implementation progresses, it will be important to assess whether the university partnership model can yield better outcomes than the more common model of data integration and analysis by state administrative units,” the authors said. As a first-of-its-kind initiative, the iPHD project aspires to spur other state governance models to kindle policy solutions that improve population health and health equity.
Read the full blog post here.