The North Carolina Department of Health and Human Services is executing a statewide strategy to buy health, not just health care. This has led NCDHHS to incorporate whole-person care across the department, including building a statewide infrastructure and incentives to address nonmedical drivers of health, focusing on food, housing, transportation, employment, and interpersonal safety / toxic stress.

Two foundational components to this strategy are NCCARE360 and the Healthy Opportunities Pilots. NCCARE360 is the first-in-the-nation statewide coordinated care network to electronically connect those with identified needs to community resources and allow for a feedback loop on the outcome of that connection. This private-public partnership has been a key feature of North Carolina’s COVID-19 response and the backbone of the innovative Health Opportunities pilot.

Authorized under North Carolina’s Medicaid Reform 1116 Demonstration waiver in October 2018, the Healthy Opportunities Pilots present an unprecedented opportunity to test the impact of providing select evidence-based nonmedical interventions to higher-risk Medicaid managed care enrollees. The pilots will allow up to $650 million in federal and state Medicaid funding to provide pilot services related to housing, food, transportation, and interpersonal safety and toxic stress that directly impact the health outcomes and health care costs of enrollees in three regions of the state. The pilots are designed to maximize learning, strengthening the existing evidence around what suites of health-related nonmedical interventions generate the largest positive effects on health and highest return on investment for certain high-need Medicaid enrollees.

In the video above, learn from the discussion with Erika Ferguson Walsh, director of the Office of Healthy Opportunities for the North Carolina Department of Health and Human Services, on how these initiatives work together to achieve greater health outcomes across the state.

Objectives:

• Learn how North Carolina is designing, implementing, and evaluating a statewide Healthy Opportunities initiative
• Gain insights into the experience from North Carolina and how those efforts can be adapted to California through CalAIM