Challenge
There is broad general agreement that no one sector can address complex issues related to health disparities independently and that cohesive action is a critical component for driving change. However, the existence of a national partnership and plan that has been collaboratively developed does not in and of itself lead to the achievement of intended outcomes. Success is dependent on the ability of stakeholders across sectors to implement and refine the strategies and actions contained in the plan over time.
Solution
Atlas Research is assisting Office of Minority Health (OMH) within the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services's (HHS) Office of the Assistant Secretary for Health to develop and execute an implementation strategy for the National Plan for Action to Reduce Health Disparities (NPA). The existing implementation approach outlined for the NPA is based on an action management structure that requires stakeholder leadership, encourages broad participation, promotes partnership development, facilitates bi-directional information flow and communications, and establishes accountability for progress.
Result
The NPA represents the initial step in the strategically focused, cross-sector, nontraditional approach that is required to eliminate health disparities. The purpose of the contract is to assist OMH in moving from a conceptual approach to a concrete and actionable implementation strategy that energizes, engages, and builds the capacity of stakeholders at the national, regional, state, and local levels.
Atlas is assisting OMH by:
- Gathering feedback from a technical advisory group of diverse experts in health disparities and strategic planning;
- Conducting a comparative assessment of pending health reform provisions and developing specific recommendations to enhance their ability to improve access to health care for communities of color;
- Supporting implementation of the NPA by drafting an implementation strategy, presenting about the NPA at relevant conferences, and collaboration with other OMH contractors;
- Providing Technical Assistance (TA) to support and sustain the implementation strategy at the national, regional, state, and community levels;
- Providing support to the Federal Interagency Health Equity Team (FIHET) subcommittees as they identify strategies for carrying out the NPA recommendations at the federal level; and
- Providing support to OMH in the development of several reports to Congress detailing the development process and progress made on the NPA.