X4 Health

The COVID-19 pandemic has underscored how critical the consumer-provider relationship is to a thriving health care system.

Many New Yorkers feel alone and struggle to navigate an unwieldy system. They are also frustrated that they have little time to interact with their clinicians. At the same time, clinicians are balancing the needs of an increasingly complex system with the needs of their patients, while also experiencing depression and burnout. To repair this frayed relationship, it is important to address the isolation of consumers and clinicians during the pandemic and lay the foundation for increased consumer empowerment during the recovery and post-pandemic periods. In 2020, NYHealth awarded X4 Health a grant to strengthen consumer-clinician relationships and to engage both consumers and clinicians in making mutually beneficial improvements to the health care system.

Under this grant, X4 Health designed, piloted, and implemented its virtual 3rd Conversation model in New York State, focused on COVID-19 recovery, rebuilding relationships, and forging patient-provider relationships to effect delivery system changes. Building on its existing in-person model, X4 Health hosted a series of virtual events to connect clinicians and patients to share their experiences during the pandemic and explore the common ground of impact. Patients and clinicians reflected on the best of their health care and relational moments; discussed how they can offer support to each other in this unprecedented time; and began to plan for the future of the health care system. These events laid the groundwork for additional strategic partnerships where patients and providers can identify mutually beneficial changes to the health care system and to their patient-provider interactions. X4 Health solicited feedback and assessed the model’s impact for improvement and replication throughout New York State.