Equality Health, the Phoenix-based technology-enabled whole-health delivery system, and Signify Health, a health services company that integrates technology and data with clinical and social care, intend to dramatically improve health outcomes and experience for Arizona’s Medicaid population with the launch of state-of-the-art technology. A newly unveiled integrated platform will facilitate collaboration among healthcare providers and community-based organizations (CBOs) to create ‘whole-person health’ teams for underserved and at-risk populations. This unique, state-wide community network powered by best-in-class software and unmatched healthcare expertise has the potential to be a national model.

Whole-person care is a culturally competent approach that is proven to reduce healthcare costs and to improve individual outcomes, particularly among people that experience disparities in care and health simply because of their ethnicity and income level. The new platform will allow professionals from critical areas—primary care, behavioral health and social services—to work in unison to address immediate individual needs, and to track changes and improvements toward outcomes over time. The integrated program launches with broad support from community-based organizations.

Equality Health and Signify Health are responding to an unmet need identified by America’s healthcare and social service providers. The idea is simple: when providers of primary care, behavioral health, and social services work together, connecting people with vital services—access to food, transportation, housing, job training and more—improved member outcomes, better adherence to care plans and reduced healthcare costs are more certain.

“Our partnership with Signify Health is representative of our vision of the healthcare model of the future whereby care is tailored to the individual,” said Hugh Lytle, Founder, Chairman, and CEO of Equality Health. “This is a game-changer for providers, managed care plans and community organizations who now have the ability to effectively solve for social determinants while establishing a wholistic outlook and history on the member.”

“Social determinants of health can’t be solved in isolation,” added Jamo Rubin, President of Signify Community. “Working together with Equality Health puts seamless care coordination and proper privacy protections in place to unite providers and CBOs into powerfully effective care teams.”

“We know that our programs are building healthier communities and now, thanks to the unified vision of Equality Health and Signify Health, we will have long-term data to tell our stories in a more compelling way,” said Julie Rosen, M.S., L.P.C., Vice President, Family and Community Services. “Social determinants of health are complex and tools like this new, collaborative digital platform help us work cohesively on behalf of our most vulnerable populations.”

Top features and capabilities of the integrated platform, designed to serve as a state-wide community network, include:

• Free access to long-term data for all participating parties

• Seamless care coordination between healthcare and social service providers

• Efficient and effective identification of at-risk members and the ability to assign care interventions

• Safe and regulatory compliant information-sharing across care settings

• A universal documentation system of clinical and social interventions on shared longitudinal records that stay with members over time and across care settings

This complete, unified platform draws on existing technologies from both entities: the CareEmpower  care coordination platform by HealthBI®, the tech division of Equality Health, and Signify Community, the social determinants of health (SDOH) platform of Signify Health. Signify Health’s technology has managed SDOH-related services for more than three million people, resulting in a 30 percent reduction in readmissions, and a 46 percent reduction in post-acute care spend. Equality Health’s CareEmpower platform has optimized outcomes for more than 20 million Medicaid, Medicare and Commercial members that close three times more quality measures and have reported a 20 percent reduction in inpatient utilization and a 25 percent reduction in 30-day readmissions.