Chartis associate partner Portia Newman takes health equity to CEOs

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This week’s Making Rounds spotlights Portia Newman, associate partner and AVP of education and engagement at the Chartis Center for Health Equity and Belonging, which is part of healthcare advisory firm Chartis.

Newman helps healthcare systems attain health equity goals, such as improving healthcare access for patients and overcoming systemic social and economic disparities. To accomplish that, she consults with managers to help them understand the goals through system assessments, trainings, and discussions.

Newman discussed how abstract ideas turn into action, and why healthcare policy changes give her optimism.

This article has been lightly edited for length and clarity.

What is the biggest misconception that people who don’t have your job might have about it?

That as consultants, we’re getting organizations or individuals in an organization started and then leaving. We’re actually really invested in seeing the development, the advancement, the growth, the changing behavior, when we’re working with a client.

I think another misconception that comes up is that because we think about integrating health equity into all parts of systems, this could be a checkbox activity. It takes time. We would love to tell people that we could solve their problems in 90 days. It’s just maybe not realistic.

How do you get people to think about that differently?

One of the things that we practice here at Chartis is that we have what we call the Health Equity & Belonging framework. We’re routing all of our next steps, big ideas, and solutions into this particular framework, and it actually starts at the foundation of getting organizations to think about their values. For some organizations, that’s going to be a people value. There are going to be values around truth, values around justice, and values around diversity.

To me, that is often the entry point. We can say, “Hey, let’s look into your structure and leadership. Let's look at your accountability metrics. Are those things aligned with your values? Where do you want to start? Patients and patient-care delivery? Community?” I think as we start to engage more clients, having that framework allows us to start with a client’s values, then we can figure out what’s the right solution—or the right next step—and ultimately, the right group of people.

Shifting gears a bit, what in the healthcare world are you most optimistic about right now?

Something that we have not wrapped our mind around is this ever-changing ecosystem of policy and legislation.

This is specifically happening in New York state. So, hospitals have what they call a required certificate of need if you want to open a new hospital or close a unit, or add beds. Now New York state has some legislation that says that, before you submit that, you have to have a health equity impact assessment.

I think that’s really powerful to say, “Let’s understand what the impacts of this particular change would be on the community,” and then require this meaningful engagement around community members.