Duke receives IBM Health Corps award to address health disparities

<p>Ebony Boulware, director of the Center for Community and Population Health Improvement, noted that&nbsp;the award will help Duke Health identify gaps in its system.&nbsp;</p>

Ebony Boulware, director of the Center for Community and Population Health Improvement, noted that the award will help Duke Health identify gaps in its system. 

Duke Health is a recipient of the IBM Health Corps award, which will allow it to receive expertise from IBM’s top employees to connect and advance community wellness programs.

The award will distribute $2.5 million total in expertise to Duke and other recipients to address disparities in health and assist with public health projects worldwide. An IBM team will spend three weeks working at Duke through its Center for Community and Population Health Improvement. Although an exact date has not yet been set, Ebony Boulware, director of the Center for Community and Population Health Improvement, and Ari Fishkind, IBM Public Affairs Officer, said that the team will arrive sometime at the beginning of 2017.

“We hope that the relationship with IBM will help us partner with others in Durham to address important community health needs," Boulware said. "IBM’s expertise will help us better understand the impact of what we and others are doing to improve health."

IBM Health Corps is a a global pro bono program that focuses on tackling health disparities. Duke is one of five institutions worldwide to receive its award.

Fishkind noted that IBM plans to gather and analyze data, meet with dozens of stakeholders and establish the groundwork for a digital platform that will allow Healthy Durham—a partnership formed to eliminate health disparities in the Durham community—to track and improve health equity within the state.

IBM Health Corps projects are focused on both the developed and industrialized worlds.

“In the industrialized world, challenges may include preventative care, lifestyle choices and so forth…Duke falls into this category,” Fishkind said.

Although North Carolina is ranked 30th in health in the U.S. according to America's Health Rankings, Durham fares worse than many other counties in areas such as quality of life according to County Health Rankings. IBM's website noted that the project at Duke would be particularly focused on the social determinants that cause health disparities within a community and ways to reduce this chasm.

Duke's challenges are well-matched with the expertise in data and trend analytics that IBM has to offer, Fishkind said.

IBM’s work at Duke will enable researchers to track health improvement activities such as efforts to reduce obesity and treat chronic diseases like diabetes or hypertension. IBM will aide Duke’s efforts in measuring health endeavors throughout the region and combining information onto a unified Population Health Improvement Mapping informatics platform, its website said.

“Any insight gleaned from the data analysis—and from creating a mechanism to examine trends—will enable providers to tailor better programs and interventions for residents,” Fishkind said. "Duke wants to make sure that as few people as possible slip through the cracks. We want to give Duke the tools to do so."

Boulware noted that Duke students interested in either health or communication technology should keep their eyes out for further information about the IBM Health Corps program. Students will be allowed to sit in on several educational sessions with IBM during the three-week period.

“The IBM Health Corps award is an exciting first step which may lead to other opportunities for collaboration,” Boulware said.

Correction: This article was updated to clarify that the IBM Health Corps will distribute a total of $2.5 million in expertise to Duke as well as other recipients, not solely to Duke. The Chronicle regrets the error. 

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