Expanding Health Care Coverage

Grantee Name

New York Academy of Medicine

Funding Area

Expanding Health Care Coverage

Publication Date

June 2014

Grant Amount

$97,707

Grant Date:

April 2011 – September 2012

While great scrutiny has been placed on the coverage expansion provisions of federal health care reform, important prevention and population health provisions have received less attention and are not widely understood by New York State policymakers, providers, and payers.

Much of the focus related to implementation of the Affordable Care Act (ACA) has been on the delivery system reform innovations spurred by federal reform; largely absent from the debate was discussion of how these strategies can be implemented in a way that maximizes population health. The timing is ideal for considering how new opportunities could be used to create incentives for improvements in prevention and population health.

To maximize prevention and population health opportunities and reduce spending, the New York Health Foundation (NYHealth) awarded New York Academy of Medicine a grant in 2011 to produce a State resource for organizing its implementation of federal health care reform provisions.

Outcomes and Lessons Learned

  • Convened health services delivery innovators, including those with expertise on accountable care organizations and primary care medical homes, to identify strategies for incorporating preventive and population health as goals in delivery system reform; and
  • Produced a single report that highlighted opportunities for policymakers and other stakeholders, “Federal Health Care Reform in New York State: A Population Health Perspective,” which was released in June 2012.

Initially, NYAM set out to produce two complementary reports, but as the project unfolded, the two reports were merged into one to serve as a road map for implementing prevention and population health provisions. Among findings and recommendations:

  • An analysis of clinical prevention, community prevention, and public health infrastructure provisions enacted by federal health reform;
  • An explanation of New York State’s current standing with respect to each provision;
  • Key issues New York State needs to address to implement the provisions;
  • Specific recommendations on how the State and local communities could best compete for federal funds; and
  • Recommendations to leverage delivery system reform to maximize prevention and population health.