States and payors are increasingly mandating commercial health plans to obtain the Health Equity Accreditation (formerly the Multicultural Health Care Distinction) from the National Committee for Quality Assurance (NCQA) as a means to demonstrate their commitment to measuring disparities and addressing social determinants of health (SDoH). 

Looking ahead, earning this accreditation is expected to become the norm rather than the exception. Leading the way in this regard are Covered California and Pennsylvania Medicaid, pioneering the requirement for their respective plans to earn the accreditation. 

As of 2022, 57 organizations, offering coverage to 22 million Americans, have earned the Health Equity Accreditation.

In order to achieve the Health Equity Accreditation, plans undergo an extensive assessment that typically spans nearly a year. Their performance is evaluated across six key standards:

For a full list of standards and how Violet helps you achieve each one, download the form at the end of the article.

In the competitive health care market, commercial plans are eagerly seeking ways to stand out, leading them to pursue the accreditation. However, survey respondents have identified data requirements as the primary obstacle in obtaining this recognition. This is where Violet's groundbreaking technology comes in. 

We’ve developed the first standardized, community-specific measure of provider cultural competence in health care, called Violet Benchmarks. Violet addresses the data challenge for articulating provider network cultural responsiveness, enabling plans to not only achieve recognition from prestigious accrediting bodies such as NCQA and URAC but also gain a holistic overview of their network's inclusivity and diversity. 

We take pride in providing data insights that surpass the requirements set by NCQA, empowering partnering organizations to differentiate themselves by thoroughly understanding their provider base. 

What we deliver:

• Immediate insights into the inclusive care capabilities of all provider organizations within your network, specifically tailored to serving LGBQ, TGNC, and BIPOC communities
• Provider sexual orientation & gender identity (SOGI) data
• Provider race, ethnicity, and language data (REaL) data
• Comparative analysis of your network’s inclusivity relative to all providers within a specific geographic region or service area to aid in the sales process
• Customizable reporting for employers and internal stakeholders
• CE/CME accredited education designed to impact quality measures

Benefits:

• With Violet’s real-time network inclusivity monitoring, you can quickly assess the cultural responsiveness of your network at a glance. This allows for continuous evaluation and reconciliation in-house, empowering you with actionable and objective data to constantly evolve and report on the network's quality. 
• Increase the likelihood of receiving recognition from accrediting bodies like URAC or NCQA by providing a comprehensive and objective assessment of the cultural responsiveness, diversity, and language proficiencies within your practitioner network.
• Equip your provider networks with the essential knowledge and skills to drive continuous improvement in specific quality measures, and enhance patient safety through the assignment of targeted, evidence-based educational pathways.
• Uncover and address cultural competence and language access gaps at the individual organizational level or by service area, giving you the power to influence provider networks in actively addressing and closing those gaps, which can be achieved through sponsored training via direct partnership with Violet.
• Empower business development teams to articulate the quantifiable inclusivity of your network with confidence when responding to RFPs.

Impact and success stories:

• Violet's evidence-based benchmarking framework was validated through a pilot program focused on mental health patient-provider matching, providing credibility to the hypothesis that culturally responsive care is not solely dependent on shared cultural perspectives or identities between the patient and provider. By connecting patients with Violet-verified inclusive providers tailored to their specific identity, the pilot achieved retention and adherence rates surpassing industry standards by 40% for mental health interventions.
• Numerous partnering provider organizations have uncovered skill gaps and identified opportunities to enhance cultural responsiveness in their care for specific communities. Through targeted educational interventions facilitated by Violet, Brightline successfully increased access to trans-inclusive providers by 5x.
• Partner organizations are seeing improved clinical outcomes such as higher therapeutic alliance scores and a greater change in PHQ-9 scores after using Benchmarks to coordinate more personalized care.
• Partnering organizations are increasingly realizing that provider cultural competency data is an essential piece of the quality improvement puzzle.  This recognition comes after successfully attaining reduced time to care, enhanced match success, improved adherence rates, and an impressive 14% increase in retention rates, all accomplished by leveraging Benchmark data as a guide for care coordination.
• Using Violet’s unmatched provider data, partnering care delivery organizations have expanded access with 3x more qualified, culturally competent providers, without compromising care quality, challenging the common assumption that culturally sensitive care requires shared backgrounds between provider and patient.

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For a full list of standards and how Violet helps you achieve each one, download below.

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