Assessing Performance of ZCTA-Level and Census Tract-Level Social and Environmental Risk Factors in a Model Predicting Hospital Events
06/01/2023
Predictive analytics are used in primary care to efficiently direct health care resources to high-risk patients to prevent unnecessary health care utilization and improve health. Social determinants of health (SDOH) are important features in these models, but they are poorly measured in administrative claims data. In this article published in Social Science & Medicine, Hilltop researchers Leigh Goetschius, PhD, Morgan Henderson, PhD, Fei Han, PhD, and colleagues found that increasing the granularity of area-based risk factors did not dramatically improve model fit or predictive performance. However, it did affect model interpretation.