{"id":201614,"date":"2023-07-31T13:30:42","date_gmt":"2023-07-31T17:30:42","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/?p=201614"},"modified":"2023-07-31T13:10:19","modified_gmt":"2023-07-31T17:10:19","slug":"population-health-team-exhibits-leadership-at-multiple-levels","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/2023\/07\/population-health-team-exhibits-leadership-at-multiple-levels\/","title":{"rendered":"Population Health Team Exhibits Leadership at Multiple Levels"},"content":{"rendered":"

Now in its fifth year, UConn Health\u2019s population health team continues on a mission to break down barriers to care.<\/p>\n

\"group
Members of the UConn Health Population Health team volunteer at CT Foodshare event at the North End Senior Center in Hartford May 11, 2023, including (top, from left:) Jasmine Ortiz-Rivas, Angelica Van Ostrand, Wendy Martinson, Alissa Keyes, Khadija Poitras-Rhea, Jennifer Boucher, (bottom, from left:) Eleanor Szmurlo, Jan Marie Andersen, and Beata Labunko. (Photo provided by Khadija Poitras-Rhea)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

What started as a department of one when Khadija Poitras-Rhea, assistant vice president for population health, arrived to establish it in 2019, it\u2019s now a group of 20, including three clinical patient navigators, three community health specialists, two social workers, two nurse educators, a pharmacist, a data scientist, an analyst, and a management team.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe collaborate with care teams daily to improve health outcomes and address social needs for our patients,\u201d Poitras-Rhea says. \u201cOur team motivates our patients to take an active role in managing their health and provide support and compassion during challenging times.\u201d<\/p>\n

Obstacles to care may include transportation, affordability of medication, food or nutrition deficiency, or an absence of caregiver support in the home.<\/p>\n

For those whose challenges are compounded by more complex needs, such as a chronic condition or a new diagnosis, the population health team provides care management resources to help them manage those needs. Sometimes it\u2019s as simple as staying in regular contact with patients to remind them to keep their appointments or keep them on track with preventive care goals.<\/p>\n

A notable example of the difference the population health team can make is the story of how it helped a patient overcome challenges of homelessness and chronic health problems<\/a>. He\u2019s lived in his own apartment in the two years since.<\/p>\n

\n

Leadership is not about your title, it\u2019s about how you motivate others, mentor emerging leaders and influence change.
\n — Khadija Poitras-Rhea<\/cite><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

In this line of work, leadership has added importance. Poitras-Rhea provides direction to a team whose members, in turn, provide direction to their patients.<\/p>\n

\u201cLeadership is an integral value that has tremendous impact on organizations, teams and individual employees,\u201d Poitras-Rhea says. \u201cA true leader is collaborative and skilled at aligning teams to reach a common goal. Leadership is not about your title, it\u2019s about how you motivate others, mentor emerging leaders and influence change. The population health team embraces these core values.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Khadija
Khadija Poitras-Rhea is UConn Heatlh’s assistant vice president for population health. (Tina Encarnacion\/UConn Health Photo)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

And she believes in leading by example.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt is important for my team to know that I am committed to this work and I\u2019m willing to work alongside them to accomplish our goals,\u201d Poitras-Rhea, herself a licensed clinical social worker, says. \u201cI try to make sure my team understands how their work impacts \u2018the big picture.\u2019 We review our metrics quarterly, celebrate success and look for ways to improve. Communication is key.\u201d<\/p>\n

Under her leadership, Poitras-Rhea\u2019s group\u2019s recent accomplishments include:<\/p>\n

    \n
  • Achieving a score of 94.7 (out of 100) in the Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) Merit-based Incentive Payment System, an assessment of a medical group\u2019s performance on the quality of care, overall cost and interoperability requirements.<\/li>\n
  • Obtaining more than $2.5 million in shared savings, care coordination payments and quality incentives for the fiscal year ending June 2022.<\/li>\n
  • Expanding UConn Health\u2019s social determinants of health screening programs to include a pilot in the labor and delivery unit to support new Joint Commission and CMS requirements for increased screening and addressing health disparities.<\/li>\n
  • In collaboration with the UConn Health Department of Psychiatry, increasing patient access to mental health services by embedding psychiatrists in nine primary care practices.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n

    Additionally, UConn Health is joining a national accountable care organization (ACO) through Signify Health, a health care platform that creates value-based payment programs. Starting Jan. 1, UConn Health will work with a network of physician groups to collectively reduce avoidable costs and improve health outcomes for the traditional Medicare population.<\/p>\n

    The population health team is a diverse group that serves a perhaps even more diverse population, which provides another leadership opportunity.<\/p>\n

    \u201cRepresentation matters,\u201d Poitras-Rhea says. \u201cIt is important for women, people of color, and any underrepresented group to see someone who looks like them that is accomplishing their goals. The goal may be obtaining a graduate degree, transitioning into a new role, or securing a leadership position. It is important that we mentor the next generation of diverse leaders and inspire others along the way.\u201d<\/p>\n

    And one of Poitras-Rhea\u2019s greatest sources of pride is how her group works together.<\/p>\n

    \u201cThe population health team not only supports patients but also each other, whether it\u2019s encouraging a co-worker to enroll in a class or listening and providing feedback on a complex case,\u201d she says. \u201cThey truly are a phenomenal team.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

    AVP Khadija Poitras-Rhea explains how her team demonstrates leadership, with the patients it serves and among its own members<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":111,"featured_media":201613,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_crdt_document":"","wds_primary_category":0,"wds_primary_series":0,"wds_primary_attribution":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1715,2231,179,2306],"tags":[],"magazine-issues":[],"coauthors":[2010],"class_list":["post-201614","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-community-impact","category-health-well-being","category-uconn-health","category-uconn-voices"],"pp_statuses_selecting_workflow":false,"pp_workflow_action":"current","pp_status_selection":"publish","acf":[],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-05-09 20:35:56","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts\/201614","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/users\/111"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=201614"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts\/201614\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":201803,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts\/201614\/revisions\/201803"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/media\/201613"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=201614"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=201614"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=201614"},{"taxonomy":"magazine-issue","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/magazine-issues?post=201614"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=201614"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}