From healthcare to health: A proposed pathway to population health.

Innovations in payment are encouraging clinical-community partnerships that address health determinants. However, little is known about how healthcare systems transform and partner to improve population health. We synthesized views of population health experts from nine organizations and illustrated the resulting model using examples from four health systems.

Health Systems Innovation at Academic Health Centers: Leading in a New Era of Health Care Delivery.

Challenged by demands to reduce costs and improve service delivery, the U.S. health care system requires transformational change.

The practice perspective on transformation: experience and learning from the frontlines.

Background: The transition of a primary care practice to a patient-centered medical home can be arduous. It requires time and resources from staff and leaders. Evidence to date suggests that not all medical homes are equally successful and that there is a substantial difference between the achievement of medical home recognition and meaningful transformation.

The Harvard Medical School Academic Innovations Collaborative: transforming primary care practice and education.

Problem: Academic medical centers (AMCs) need new approaches to delivering higher-quality care at lower costs, and engaging trainees in the work of high-functioning primary care practices.

Approach: In 2012, the Harvard Medical School Center for Primary Care, in partnership with with local AMCs, established an Academic Innovations Collaborative (AIC) with the goal of transforming primary care education and practice. This novel two-year learning collaborative consisted of hospital- and community-based primary care teaching practices, committed to building highly functional teams, managing populations, and engaging patients.

Early experience of a safety net provider reorganizing into an accountable care organization.

Although safety net providers will benefit from health insurance expansions under the Affordable Care Act, they also face significant challenges in the postreform environment. Some have embraced the concept of the accountable care organization to help improve quality and efficiency while addressing financial shortfalls. The experience of Cambridge Health Alliance (CHA) in Massachusetts, where health care reform began six years ago, provides insight into the opportunities and challenges of this approach in the safety net.

Healing a community by innovating at a community health center.

Somava Stout led care transformation at a Boston-area clinic and now spearheads implementation of the patient-centered medical home model at the Cambridge Health Alliance.