Heartland Whole Health Institute tests ways to expand health care

Heartland Whole Health Institute tests ways to expand health care

The Heartland Whole Health Institute wants to create playbooks for making health care more affordable and accessible that other institutions can follow.

Why it matters: Most Americans are concerned about affording and accessing health care, and rural states like Arkansas face unique struggles in reaching patients.

Zoom in: The institute connected Mercy Health System with the Boston Mountain Rural Health Center to offer some telehealth services in cardiology in areas the center was serving that didn't have access to specialty care.

  • Some states have given doctors financial incentives like paying student loans in exchange for them practicing in rural areas.
  • "Those programs are great, but they've only gotten us so far … How do we leverage technology for some of these areas where we may just never be able to recruit rural providers?" the institute's vice president and chief of value-based initiatives Angela Lappin told Axios.

    • Catch up quick: The institute is a resource hub for health care policy, education and delivery and seeks to identify problems, convene the right partners and come up with solutions, Lappin and president Claude Pirtle told Axios.

  • "It's all about access to us. Everything we're touching is access, decreased cost and enhanced outcomes," Pirtle said.

    • Context: The Heartland Whole Health Institute and the Alice L. Walton School of Medicine on the Crystal Bridges campus in Bentonville are both part of Walton's "whole health" initiatives, which emphasize physical and mental health, preventive care and healthy lifestyles.

  • Walton's work is part of a regional push to ramp up health care after a 2019 report commissioned by the Northwest Arkansas Council found that the region was missing out on nearly $1 billion annually in the health care economy. The report said the region needs more specialty care and health care education to serve its growing population.

    • State of play: The institute recommends value-based health care systems — where providers have agreements with insurance companies and get paid based on patient outcomes — rather than fee-for-service models, where providers are paid based on visits, tests and procedures, Lappin and Pirtle told Axios.

  • Value-based care emphasizes primary care and is a simpler system for patients, leading to improved health and quality of life, while not cutting pay for health care workers, Lappin said. Insurance companies also pay for fewer higher-cost procedures.

    • Case in point: The Heartland Whole Health Institute recently launched a technical assistance center to help organizations interested in launching or growing medical residency programs navigate government funding and conduct feasibility studies.

  • "If you don't have someone who's a subject matter expert to help you navigate that, it's really unlikely that you're going to get it off the ground because it's just really so complicated," Lappin said.
  • Graduate medical education is a major focus among government and health care leaders as the state has more medical school graduates than residency slots, meaning it's investing in future doctors who have to leave the state to complete their residencies.

    • Flashback: The Legislature in 2025 passed Act 269, joining most states in the Interstate Medical License Compact, an agreement that allows doctors to practice in multiple states.

  • "That was a huge win," Pirtle said. "We helped educate around the importance in being part of that."

    • What's next: The institute plans to dig more into preventive issues that affect health.