Qlarant has assisted NORC in areas including Research & Analysis, Program and Policy Analysis, Communications and Stakeholder Engagement, and Evaluation in the process of mining available data to identify and address disparities in health outcomes.
Qlarant’s tasks include the following:
• Provide input and review of study designs and research plans as requested by NORC.
• Conceptualize, research, and draft concepts for data analysis projects related to health disparities issues.
• For proposals approved by NORC and CMS OMH, develop a work plan, including major tasks, timelines, deliverables, and a proposed budget for authorization by Project Director, or designee
• Provide expertise and advice on health disparity and health equity issues for literature review, environmental scan and needs assessment. This includes but is not limited to developing and/or reviewing search terms for literature review, lists of key stakeholders for interviews, and interview guides; conducting interviews; and performing research on policies, programs, data sources, and legislation relevant to identifying, describing, and addressing health disparities aligned with the CMS OMH priority populations and CMS Plan for Equity in Medicare.
• Perform research on best practices, policy, and regulatory issues in areas of focus for CMS OMH and implementation activities relevant to identifying, describing, and addressing health disparities aligned with the CMS OMH priority populations and CMS Plan for Equity in Medicare.
• Identify key stakeholders considered as experts on health disparities to be targeted for partnership, coalition and stakeholder engagement. Stakeholder lists will be developed in consultation with CMS OMH, NORC, and other partners as appropriate.
• Provide expertise and advice on health disparity and health equity issues to inform the development of stakeholder engagement plans, including education, outreach and dissemination planning, and partnership, coalition and stakeholder engagement.
• Provide feedback on product concepts, message development, or other communications planning products (with respect to content on health disparities),
• Provide input into which key stakeholders and other partners to engage and contribute to reviewing and writing sections of reports, as requested by Task 3 lead, or their designee.
• Assist in developing and executing new training content as needed and per the approved training work plan.
• Provide expertise and advice to NORC and CMS OMH on embedding equity into strategic plans, policies, and programs through technical assistance.
• Provide expertise and advice on quality improvement efforts to reduce health disparities and increase health equity for CMS OMH priority populations to inform the design and execution of plan to evaluate activities implemented as part of this project. This could include but is not limited to developing logic models, selecting monitoring and evaluation measures, drafting analytic plans, devising stakeholder engagement strategies, and preparing reports on evaluation results.
• Assist in conceptualizing, drafting, and reviewing evaluation plans for the overall project and individual activities implemented through this project. Assist Project Director, or designee, in preparing annual reports contributing to sections reporting on work conducted by Qlarant Quality Solutions, Inc. in other tasks that are part of this contract.
