Health Equity: Innovation, Inclusion & Insights

There is no shortage of statistics that highlight health disparities in the U.S. by age, income, gender, and of course, race and ethnicity. 42% of Black Americans and 21% of Hispanic Americans report experiencing prejudice and discrimination in healthcare encounters compared to 5% of White Americans. Black and Native American women in the U.S. have maternal mortality rates that are 2-3x higher than average… and in New York City it is up to 8x higher for Black women. Before vaccines and other treatments, Black and Hispanic Americans were 3x more likely to be infected with COVID and 2x more likely to die from that infection. 

As society and institutions of all kinds increase their focus on social justice and diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) initiatives, healthcare organizations are rallying around health equity. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention defines health equity as the state in which “every person has the opportunity to attain his or her full health potential and no one is disadvantaged from achieving this potential because of social position or other socially determined circumstances.” These initiatives typically focus on a range of marginalized groups: Black, Hispanic, and Native Americans (who together constitute 33% of the U.S. population); people who identify as LGBTQ+ (7%); individuals in rural communities (23%); people living in poverty (11%); and people with disabilities (25%).

Like all DEI work, health equity is difficult. There are lots of ups and downs as progress is made, and more questions arise as we advance. Questions like how do we better center healthcare systems on women and people of color? How do we increase access and education for patients and cultural competency for providers? How do we make clinical trials and all types of research more inclusive? How do we think about intersectionality in healthcare? How do we think about patient mental health in the wake of these disparities? And how can we use both technology and DEI to innovate in healthcare?

View our on demand webinar as Ipsos’ Janelle James hosts a dynamic conversation on innovation, inclusion, and insights in Health Equity tackling these questions and more. Our guest panelists are phenomenal leaders literally shaping the future of healthcare, technology, DEI initiatives, and society at large:

• Kim Saxon, Senior Qualitative Consultant, Ipsos UU
• Alexis Anderson, Principal, Ipsos Healthcare Advisory Services
• Charles Fan, General Manager, Babylon Health
• Alexandria Wise-Brown, Principal Medical Science Director, Alzheimer’s Disease, Genentech
• Carlos Nunez, M.D., Chief Medical Officer, ResMed

Please be sure to also take part in our health equity survey – click here for details.