America’s Health Rankings sat down with leaders in the public health space to discuss how access to actionable data helps them to address key health challenges. To hear the rest of our conversations, watch the full video here.
Mylynn Tufte currently serves as the Senior Director for Population Health at Optum Advisory, where she uses technology to improve health equity and the social determinants of health for vulnerable populations. Notably, she was instrumental as one of the founding members in establishing the Optum Center for Health Equity. In addition, she has 25 years of health care experience, including as the leading former health official for the state of North Dakota.
How has America’s Health Rankings benefitted you in your career both in the public and private sector?
I came to know America's Health Rankings when I led the Department of Health for the state of North Dakota. The platform was a gold standard for how we looked at our programs and services compared to other states, which allowed us to benchmark ourselves reliably. In the public sector, the ability to coalesce around data, drive public programs and be good stewards of taxpayer dollars is really important.
Then, I carried my love for America’s Health Rankings through when I joined the Optum Center for Health Equity in the private sector. In this role, when I consult with states and state health plans, it's so important to be informed on the health of the state, including where the funding might be and what's happening in that state’s communities.
For example, when I am talking to state officials about their public health programs, the data from America’s Health Rankings helps provide insights on where to direct resources and funding in a meaningful way. So, tools like America’s Health Rankings gives me the data and intelligence to understand local problems and how to achieve successful outcomes.
What distinguishes America’s Health Rankings from other available public health data?
What makes America's Health Rankings different from other data sets is its long tenure and proven track record, with 30+ years of delivering the nation's health data in a standardized way. The platform also has an advisory board which brings an independent, trusted viewpoint on the issues that matter most to public health leaders in our country. As technologies have progressed, America's Health Rankings has too, giving users the ability to adjust data sets for easy use, saving them a lot of time, money and effort.
How does America’s Health Rankings contribute to the goal of health equity?
It's really important for the policymakers who are making decisions around public health programs to have access to accurate, reliable data around health disparities. What America's Health Rankings allows us to do is encourage policymakers to be data-informed, and to use that data to take action.
Moreover, with America’s Health Rankings' emphasis on all aspects of population well-being, the platform has cultivated a greater understanding and awareness of the social factors impacting health. Probably 70 to 80% of an individual's health outcomes result from these social factors, like one’s access to care, ability to get a good education and live in a safe physical environment. So, if we're trying to reduce health disparities, it's important to understand not just issues of medical access and coverage, but also have in-depth knowledge of these other social factors which come into play. That’s why we're fortunate to access trusted data sources like America’s Health Rankings to highlight the populations that are at risk and what we can do about them.
What role does data play in shaping public health initiatives that advance community and population health?
The role that data plays to advance community and population health is so important. It starts with data that you trust which has been collected in a meaningful, reliable way. That allows public health officials to know where our baseline is, where our challenges are and identify the areas that we need to focus on. Having done that, we can then put those public health strategies to work based on what the data tells us is most actionable. Afterwards, we can re-examine our programs with this data to question if we made a difference, whether these are the right programs, and whether public health trends are improving. If not, reliable data platforms like America’s Health Rankings still allow us to investigate what more we can do.