CMS has released a multipronged health equity strategy to be used throughout the agency and is encouraging healthcare leaders to get involved in creating sustainable, equitable strategies, CMS reported April 20.
Each CMS office has been charged with improving health equity by embedding several strategies into all work. The strategies include expanding outreach of existing programs, evaluating policies to determine how CMS can support safety-net providers and expanding and standardizing the use of data.
CMS is also encouraging health leaders to take health equity seriously and fold it into their own system's strategies. To do so it is convening providers, leaders, payers and state officials to share best practices and learn how to create effective health equity initiatives.
"We can’t achieve our health system goals until everyone can attain the highest level of health. That's why I am inviting the healthcare industry to work alongside CMS as we transform the way patients are cared for in our country," said Chiquita Brooks-LaSure, CMS administrator. "Health equity will be embedded within the DNA of CMS and serve as the lens through which we view all of our work."
Read the full list of health equity strategies here.