NEJM June 5, 2018
Michelle Jester and Erin Benson both want to help identify patients whose health could be at risk due to various social, economic, and environmental factors. Their approaches, however, diverge sharply.
Jester is Research Manager at the National Association of Community Health Centers, where she oversees rollout of a risk tool based on asking patients a series of 16 core and 4 optional questions. These cover areas such as income, social support, and incarceration history. In contrast, Benson, Director of Market Planning at LexisNexis Health Care, employs a tool that gathers information about these same areas and more without asking any potentially awkward questions at all.