By Liz Carey
Rural medical groups and health advocates are warning drug companies to abide by federal guidelines that require them to provide discounts to some small, rural hospitals.
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A look at the top 5 Clinical Risk Management Program from ECRI that were accessed during 2020:

• Federal Tort Claims Act (FTCA) Risk Management Virtual Conference
• Guidance: Managing Risks in Ambulatory Care
• Sample Risk Management Plan for a Community Health Center
• Guidance: Overview of the Risk Management Process
• Practice Alert! Conducting Risk Assessments: A Checklist

Login to the Clinical Risk Management Program website to review these tools and more. If you need help navigating the site or finding resources, email clinical_rm_program@ecri.org.

The Health and Human Services (HHS) Office of Disease Prevention and Health Promotion has launched the Healthy People 2030 Leading Health Indicators (LHIs) and Overall Health and Well-Being Measures (OHMs). Together, LHIs and OHMs will help you set priorities and track nationwide progress toward improving health and well-being. LHIs are a small subset of high-priority Healthy People 2030 core objectives that help you focus resources and efforts on critical public health issues to improve health and well-being in your community. OHMs are broad, global outcome measures that help health professionals evaluate the health of the nation. When OHMs improve, it reflects efforts to achieve Healthy People objectives, particularly LHIs. And improvements in OHMs mean the nation is moving closer to fulfilling the Healthy People 2030 vision: “A society in which all people can achieve their full potential for health and well-being across the lifespan.”

The U.S. Health and Human Services (HHS) has released a Viral Hepatitis National Strategic Plan for the United States: A Roadmap to Elimination (2021-2025). The plan is a crucial element to advancing elimination efforts and will serve as a framework to implement strategies and address the rising number of hepatitis cases. The plan also recognizes the syndemic of viral hepatitis, HIV, STIs and substance use disorders, the mitigation of which will require integrated, interventional strategies that address whole-person health. The integrated approach is critical for the success of prevention and treatment strategies as the opioid use crisis continues to drive increases in hepatitis cases.

The National Opinion Research Center (NORC) launched the Adolescent Screening, Brief Intervention and Referral to Treatment Project (SBIRT). This is a four-part webinar series which introduces health professionals to the SBIRT model to learn from adolescents about their substance use, talk about what might motivate them to decide to reduce or abstain (if needed) from substances, and execute a plan to do so. This program is free and allows you to mix and match the many offered dates. View the schedule and register here.

A recently announced partnership between Morehouse School of Medicine and CommonSpirit Health will invest $100 million over 10 years to train more Black physicians and work toward health equity for underserved communities. The partnership will create five new regional campuses and graduate educational medical programs in at least 10 markets to be announced in the spring, according to an announcement this week. Read the article from the Atlanta Constitution.