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Create and support formal mechanisms for strategic collaboration and communication between health care and public health agencies, building on existing efforts whenever possible.

Coalition actions:

• Develop/encourage member participation in the development of Memoranda of Agreements for voluntary use in data and resource sharing (in addition to mandatory reporting), operational partnerships, and technical assistance provision between local hospitals/health systems, physician groups, and local/state public health agencies. (KP, AHA, AMA, ACHP, AHIP)
• Encourage members to participate in or create regional working groups with local health systems, payers, health care professionals, and public health agency staff (e.g., Chief Medical Officers and External Affairs teams or equivalent decision-makers) to share regular updates and feedback from the ground about issues being experienced locally. (AHA, AHIP, ACHP, AMA)
• Encourage members to build on existing public-facing maps and/or dashboards, or develop new ones in partnership with public health using health system, hospital, payer, and public health data (in a manner that uses aggregation and other tools to comply with legal requirements) to show health outcomes and inform potential interventions. (AHA, ACHP, AHIP)
• Encourage members to share available information about areas with potentially vulnerable patients, such as areas with patients who rely on equipment or medical support that may be at risk during an emergency. (ACHP, AHIP)
• Participate in or encourage member participation in formal working groups or regular communication with local and state public health leadership to discuss emerging and ongoing challenges (e.g., anticipate and mitigate seasonal surges). If these working groups do not already exist, support the creation of them with public health. Identify opportunities to increase visibility of public health initiatives and champion the role of public health in maintaining healthy communities.
• Establish joint efforts with public health agencies to coordinate combatting and preventing the spread of misinformation. (AHA, AMA)

Examples in action →

Establish and enhance systems for rapidly deploying licensed and trained health care staff during times of need.

Coalition actions:

• Identify the core barriers for health care staff participation in disaster staffing programs, and explore opportunities to address those barriers through organizational policy change and/or in partnership with federal, state, and local governing bodies. (KP, AMA)
• Encourage members to join or establish regular meetings with state and local health departments in order to ensure payer/plan role clarity in emergency preparedness planning and operations. (ACHP, AHIP)
• Identify, amplify, and encourage expansion of emergency command structure models that include functionalities to easily redeploy staff to other roles as needed for emergencies. (KP)
• Encourage members to adopt shared staffing models, including those demonstrated to be effective during the COVID-19 pandemic, for hospitals across the country. (AHA)
• Advocate for the expansion or creation of disaster medical staffing programs (e.g., National Disaster Medical System or similar state/regional systems) or the integration of health training into existing non-health programs such as the National Guard. (AHA)
• Encourage members to participate in existing interstate compacts for their practice area. (AMA)
• During times of disaster or public emergency, make data available to help credential and deploy physicians faster. (AMA)

Examples in action →

Invest in data infrastructure to facilitate real-time data sharing and analysis with public health, particularly to improve health equity.

Coalition actions:

• Create or expand mechanisms for bidirectional data sharing between health systems/health care professionals, and public health, such as via Memoranda of Agreement, Data Sharing Agreements (DSA), health code revisions for health data reporting such as laboratory and immunization registry reporting, and demographic data capture (in addition to mandatory reporting). (KP, AHA)
• Encourage members to support data sharing regarding immunization rates (and other data as identified as useful) for public health agencies and health insurers to work together to improve uptake. (ACHP, AHIP)
• Identify ways to facilitate feedback loops of population-level data and information from public health agencies back to health care professionals so they are aware of what’s happening in their clinics and the surrounding area. (AMA, AHA)
• Encourage members to collect and share data to identify and address health inequities (including barriers to care) beyond the clinical setting, while ensuring transparency, appropriate use, and confidentiality. (AMA, AHA)
• Encourage members to adopt models for real-time analytics that include demographic data stratification, such as those aligned with established health information technology standards and public health guidance, where appropriate based on hospital and system size/need. (AHA)
• Prioritize opportunities to improve data sharing as part of efforts to make value-based care expertise, technology, and services available to accelerate the adoption of value-based care in diverse, multi-payer, multi-provider, community-based health system environments. (AMA)

Examples in action →

Implement electronic data exchange mechanisms – such as electronic case reporting (eCR) – to improve completeness and consistency of reported health data.

Coalition actions:

• Promote member participation in eCR, syndromic detection, and other types of electronic data exchange. (AHA, AHIP, ACHP, AMA)
• Encourage members to promote and positively incentivize provider and system participation in eCR, syndromic detection, and other types of electronic data exchange, including for ambulatory health care practices. (AHIP, ACHP)
• Encourage members to identify and participate in existing cross-sector partnerships at local, county, or state levels to troubleshoot issues and amplify the benefit of interoperability of eCR and other electronic data exchange. (ACHP, AHIP, AHA, KP, AMA)
• Encourage health plans to work with lab companies to identify opportunities together to make tests as affordable as possible to facilitate broader capture of cases. (AHIP, ACHP, AHA)
• Facilitate the broader capture of reportable conditions by supporting and/or prioritizing the following strategies (KP):
  • Implement cross-system electronic data exchange to improve the completeness and accuracy of eCR of reportable conditions.
  • Build data capture forms into patient-facing software to ensure updated demographic and occupational data flow through as part of electronic data exchange platforms.
• Encourage members to implement eCR for reportable diseases beyond COVID-19, such as certain sexually transmitted infections, when appropriate. (AHA)
• Encourage members to compile organization-specific sets of improvements for EHR functionality related to eCR and automated syndromic detection such as making set-up easier and triggers non-redundant — as well as compatible with industry transitions to FHIR-based data exchange — and share these needs with EHR vendors. (AHA, AMA)

Examples in action →

Actively participate in efforts to implement peer-reviewed national standards for health care emergency management programs.

Coalition actions:

• Participate/encourage member participation in multi-disciplinary working groups (including public health agency partners) focused on improving health care readiness and resiliency. This may include developing health care emergency management standards with public health agencies and identifying and encouraging health care best practices that can be shared through existing channels such as local and national health care associations. (KP, AHA, ACHP, AHIP, AMA)

  Best practices may include (but are not limited to):

  • Activation and use of surge staffing plans
  • Data sharing agreements with public health agencies
  • Training on health care incident management teams and activation protocols
  • Creating ready-to-deploy template emergency contracts
  • Identifying hazard-specific equipment and supply Periodic Automatic Replenishment (PAR) levels
  • Partnering with local response authorities regarding Emergency Support Function 8 (ESF-8) response expectations
• Identify and support positive payment incentives that encourage hospitals and health systems to adopt standards and best practices for preparedness. (AHA)
• Create opportunities to elevate the voices of state and local health through storytelling — including (but not limited to) physicians, nurses, hospitals, health insurers, and emergency managers to share experiences and needs for an "always on" emergency preparedness system, including needs related to surge staffing plans, staff training on response structure and equity considerations for the response, and ongoing equipment and supply levels. (AMA, AHA, AHIP, ACHP, KP)
• Advocate for adequate resource needs and federal, state, and local public health-driven preparedness programs, such as the Public Health Emergency Preparedness Program and the Hospital Preparedness Program. (AHA)

Examples in action →

Support the implementation of key federal actions focused on improving coordination between public health and health care.

• Enhance health care’s impact on addressing Social Determinants of Health (SDOH) and Health Related Social Needs (HRSN) by implementing specific actions, which may include (but are not limited to) those highlighted in the CMS Health Equity Framework, the U.S. Playbook to Address Social Determinants of Health, and Healthy People 2030.
• Support the expansion of the National Special Pathogen System of Care, as proposed by the National Emerging Special Pathogens Training and Education Center (NETEC).
• Implement and invest in the adoption of industry standards for data exchange between health care and public health, focusing on those identified by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), the Office of the National Coordinator for Health IT (ONC), Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS), or other federal partners (e.g., Fast Healthcare Interoperability Resources, FHIR® and United States Core Data for Interoperability).
• Actively engage with the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) and related federal agencies on the implementation of demographic data collection standards (once proposed regulations are finalized).
• Participate in efforts related to the Trusted Exchange Framework and Common Agreement (TEFCA).

Coalition actions:

• Support these federal efforts by providing education and technical assistance through member organizations and/or respective networks and key stakeholders. (KP, AHA, ACHP, AHIP, AMA)
• Sign Coalition-branded letters of support and/or feedback on federal policy related to these areas of work, where appropriate and mutually agreed upon by all members. (KP, AHA, AMA, AHIP, ACHP)
• Support funding for public health agencies leading this work, and use stories to make the impact tangible. (KP, AHA, ACHP, AHIP, AMA)

Examples in action →