A potential fix for the “tragedy of the commons” facing mental health and social service agencies was the focus of the keynote address by Jeffrey Brenner, MD, at the 33rd Annual Symposium on Health Care Services in New York: Research and Practice.
Dr. Brenner, chief executive officer of The Jewish Board, one of the largest social service agencies in the state, asserted that certain measures would go a long way in driving down skyrocketing health care costs that he says are strangling the capacity of social service organizations. The creation of a health care and social services purchasing authority to efficiently distribute government funds to meet community members' needs was among the suggested strategies.
The U.S. spends more on health care as a share of its economy than any other developed country in the world but has become an “extreme outlier” when it comes to the comparatively low portion of its GDP that goes to social service, Dr. Brenner noted.
“There are consequences to letting this system grow out of control,” Dr. Brenner told a crowd of more than 100 at the CUNY Graduate Center. “It reaches a point where the caring capacity for the economy can’t afford [health care spending] and it starts to crowd out the other things that we care about.”
The October 25 symposium, sponsored by United Hospital Fund and Greater New York Hospital Association, convened in-person for the first time since the pandemic. The annual event aims to foster collaboration on and understanding of current health care research in New York, build bridges among health services researchers and practitioners, and showcase the New York health services research community.
Following Dr. Brenner’s keynote presentation, attendees listened to a fireside chat between UHF senior vice president for policy and program Chad Shearer and Jonathan Blum, the principal deputy administrator and chief operating officer at the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS).
Blum described how CMS—which is getting ready to hire 500 more employees in the next year—will play an important role in helping the health care system transition out of the emergency stage of the pandemic. The agency's goals include addressing care gaps highlighted in the last two years and helping people who lose Medicaid coverage transition to the subsidized marketplace.
In the final panel of the symposium, experts focused on yet another public health emergency: gun violence. The discussion, entitled “Cross-Sector Solutions to Address Gun Violence," included clinical director of the Kings Against Violence Initiative (KAVI), Ramon Gist, MD; director of Northwell Health’s Center for Gun Violence Prevention, Chethan Sathya, MD; and Calliana Thomas, director of the Office of Gun Violence Prevention at the New York State Health Department.
The panelists shared significant progress in engaging the health care field in addressing the gun violence crisis, including the creation of the statewide office in the health department, the implementation of screenings for firearm risk at Northwell, and the use of KAVI’s violence intervention specialists in hospital emergency departments. But all three experts emphasized the need for more awareness and research on the issue, which is among the least funded nationwide despite being one of the top five leading causes of premature death in the country.
“We have a long way to go in reframing this as a public health issue,” Dr. Sathya told the crowd.
Throughout the symposium, attendees also got the chance to visit 20 poster presentations highlighting research and evaluation findings from across the region.
The research tackled a range of important issues, and many posters reflected on meaningful takeaways from the pandemic. Here’s a look at some of the topics:
- Addressing workforce shortages in long-term care facilities
- Identifying and supporting children experiencing homelessness
- Using peer support workers to alleviate burdens on hospital staff during substance-use related emergencies
- How to ensure the safety of home health care aides during a pandemic
- Analyzing a spike in mental health visits to emergency departments
- Highlighting the health equity-focused use of data in the city’s Test and Trace Mobile Program.
Find videos of each of the keynote presentation here: