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1) How did you decide on the workforce needed to address SDoH?
We are still working to develop a way to decide on who to recruit. While we have a general understanding of what staff may be needed to ensure that we meet patient needs, we are still gathering data on the amount of work and number of staff needed.
2) Do you have specific question(s) or a skill test to screen applicants? If so, provide an example of a question used.
For all positions, our HR department conducts a phone screening to ensure that applicants meet basic job requirements. Each department manager/director has their own set of questions that they ask prospective applicants. When I hire community resource staff, I always ask about their basic knowledge of resources and to provide concrete examples of times that they have connected patients to resources and discuss any barriers they had to overcome in the process.
3) What are the pros and cons for recruiting by word and mouth or people you/staff know?
I think in more rural areas, like at Wood River Health Services, word of mouth is beneficial because many people from other areas of the state are not willing to commute to our location. Word of mouth in our area helps to connect with people in the local community who are also well versed in the resources and challenges of a rural community health center. A con to this could be that not all applicants may meet the job requirements and their could be confusion around the role based on what people are stating about the position.1. Name: Alayna Woodley
2. Organization: Wood River Health Services
3. Role: Manager of Care Coordination
4. I am looking forward to seeing the best practices of SDOH screenings. We will be starting to implement SDOH screenings for our entire population in a couple of weeks. I am excited to gain some more information on how other do this work and the best practices behind it.
1) What is your organization currently doing, planning to do, or needing, to train staff on Social Determinants of Health (SDoH) data?
(Examples include educating staff on the importance of the social determinants, how it aligns with Patient-Centered Medical Home efforts, how to collect those determinants using the specific EHR system, and how to connect patients to available resources to meet the needs identified.)
Currently, WRHS has just started to screen patients on SDOH. 2/18/19 was the first day we started screening all patients both adult and pediatric. Once we start to obtain more data I think the next step is to look at the most prevalent needs are for our patients and discuss what options we have to increase these services; either on site or with a community partner. I think that once we have more data it can also be used to compare it to their medical diagnosis/condition to determine what SDOH factors that impact their health and if there are trends that can help our staff find better ways to
improve the patients health outcomes. I think that the SDOH data is no surprise to our community resource and case management department, as this the area of service that they work in each day. I am hopeful that this data will enhance the conversations we have with other providers, staff, partners, and state officials regarding the magnitude of need our patients have.
In discussions I have had with both staff and community partners a lot of people think that these SDOH needs are limited to the Medicaid or even Medicare population and that the commercially insured patients likely do not have these needs due to their income. In speaking with other health centers who are doing this work in Rhode Island staff has been surprised at the level of need for the commercial patients as well.
Training has begun on how to input the data into the template and who to refer to based on those answers. Moving forward, I think there will need to be training on how looking at this data can enhance patient care, what other referrals could be made, and how staff can collaborate throughout the facility to provide the most appropriate services to all our patients.