Bridging for Health: Improving Community Health Through Innovations in Financing, supported by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, is fostering connections among diverse stakeholders to align investments in order to improve population health outcomes.
To accomplish this, Bridging for Health focuses on:
- innovations in financing;
- collaboration and collective impact; and
- health and health equity.
As the national coordinating center for Bridging for Health, the Georgia Health Policy Center will customize technical assistance around the needs of each of the selected participating sites to support innovations in these three areas.
The initial four Bridging for Health sites differ in the leadership of the collaborative and potential financing mechanism being explored, but share a commitment to upstream investment in interventions to improve population health outcomes in their community. Population health recognizes factors outside of the traditional health care delivery system that significantly influence health attainment including housing, education and literacy, poverty, food availability, and access to greenspace and safe recreational areas. To address these socioeconomic determinants of health and to impact health outcomes requires a comprehensive broad group of stakeholders to collaborate health outcomes. It also requires identification of novel mechanisms to fund initiatives targeting these upstream drivers of health and wellness.
The following is part of a series introducing the first four participating sites and their partners, priorities for community health improvement, and the financing innovation they are beginning to explore. Enjoy meeting these innovators.
- Yamhill Community Care Organization in Oregon
- Allegheny County Health Department in Pennsylvania
- Bexar County Health Collaborative in San Antonio, Texas
- Spartanburg, S.C. led by the Mary Black Foundation