CHIA and Massachusetts Health & Hospital Assoc. Release Report on Social Risk Factors and Readmissions

The CHIA (Center for Health Information and Analysis) has released a report from the statewide Social Risk Factors and Readmissions Workgroup, which details the proposed solution for accounting for social risk factors in the public reporting of all-payer, unplanned hospital readmissions.

From the report: “There was a clear consensus among workgroup members that social risk factors should be included in CHIA’s public reporting of readmissions. Some members noted concerns that the policy implications of this analysis should not be misinterpreted; the goal is still for hospitals to reduce readmissions, even for populations with more social risk factors. Nonetheless, it is important to understand the degree of challenge that hospitals and their patient populations face, and to learn from the hospitals that successfully reduce readmissions despite these challenges.”

CHIA recommended including many new data points, including social factors such as sex, race homeless status, and insurance type. They also recommend including community-level social risk factors such as median family income, percent of population on food stamps/SNAP, percent of population unemployed, etc.

Click here to learn more from the CHIA.