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Contra Costa Health Services takes on whole person care by gathering every bit of data, not just medical care data, and getting it into its Epic EHR. The results have been startling.

At Health 2.0, National Coordinator for Health IT Dr. Donald Rucker and other clinical IT leaders explore the root causes of the burnout epidemic – and offer a wishlist of tech innovations that could help.

Dr. Albert Chan, chief of digital patient experience at Sutter Health, says health systems have to get better at interpreting data in novel ways to make good on their promise to patients.

Lake Washington Physical Therapy also is saving $15,000 a year using bot-powered technology to optimize access to care and build patient-first services.

Researchers used open source technology from IBM Watson to build an AI model that would ingest clinical data from de-identified sepsis patient EHR data, then used it to predict patient mortality during hospitalization and during the 90 days following discharge.

As part of its Healthy Opportunities Initiative, the North Carolina Department of Health and Human Services has enlisted Phreesia to help health systems statewide learn more about their patients' social determinants of health. WHY IT MATTERS Phreesia, patient intake platform is able to screen patients for unmet social and environmental needs that could be adversely affecting their health. It poses questions patients about various social factors and can deliver real-time alerts for providers and care coordinators, helping them better target care interventions. In addition, its analytics and reporting help health systems with population health management. Phreesia's technology will deliver North Carolina's Standardized Social Determinants of Health Screening Questions to providers across the state – helping them spot patients who may be helped by addressing certain social factors, enabling providers to be more attuned to their holistic health. Additionally, NCCARE360, North Carolina's first coordinated network connecting healthcare and human service providers, is being deployed statewide, making it easier to connect people with resources according to their needs. THE LARGER TREND Phreesia, which went public earlier this summer, points to research from Kaiser Permanente that suggests most patients want their providers to ask about their social needs and help connect them to resources. As Healthcare IT News focuses this month on social determinants of health, we've been exploring the wide variety of factors – from housing to food insecurity to domestic safety – that can have huge effects on a person's health. In North Carolina, according to the state DHHS, more than 1.2 million people cannot find affordable housing, and one in 28 children under age six is homeless. More than one in five children are living in food-insecure households, and nearly half (47 percent) of North Carolina women say they have experienced intimate partner violence. Helping connect these people with community-based programs could help, and many new initiatives are being launched to do just that. But first, providers need to know that their patients are in need. ON THE RECORD "To advance the health and well-being of North Carolinians, we need to build a coordinated, whole person-centered system that addresses both medical and non-medical drivers of health," said DHHS Secretary Dr. Mandy K. Cohen in a statement. "Our partnership with Phreesia will make it easier for doctors and other health care providers to ask patients about their non-medical health needs, which are a critical component of their overall health." "We're excited to collaborate and support NC DHHS on this important initiative," said Phreesia CEO Chaim Indig. "Helping providers identify patients' social needs allows us to further our mission of improving the healthcare experience, and we look forward to continuing this work in communities across the country." .jumbotron{ background-image: url("https://www.healthcareitnews.com/sites/hitn/files/u2556/SocialDeterminantJumbotron.jpg"); background-size: cover; color: white; } .jumbotron h2{ color: white; } Focus on Social Determinants of Health In September, Healthcare Finance News, Healthcare IT News and MobiHealthNews will take a look at the SDOH and how varied health systems, IT companies, Congress and others are addressing it. Twitter: @MikeMiliardHITN Email the writer: mike.miliard@himssmedia.com Healthcare IT News is a publication of HIMSS Media.

Deep Dive: In Part 1 of a four-part series, healthcare cybersecurity veterans discuss the major risks facing healthcare organizations, and why protecting sensitive data and systems is a must for providing care.

The health system is averaging 600 virtual visits per month with its new telehealth offering, gaining efficiencies for caregivers and boosting patient satisfaction.

It's not just for clinicians anymore: Security operations center analysts say they're inundated with more and more alerts, and spend too much time sorting through false positives.

At Adventist Health White Memorial, reducing OR turnaround time by just three minutes may seem small – but at five turnarounds per day, multiplied by six operating rooms, it adds up to $974,160 per year.