Advancing Neuropsychology Through Population Health: From Concept to Implementation

While there are many determinants that affect the health of a population, the ultimate goal for health care providers, public health professionals, employers, payers, and policymakers is improving the overall health of a population. This book instructs readers on the basic principles of population health, its neuropsychological applications at the organizational and community level, and emerging models of primary care and neuropsychological practice to meet population health demands. With the daunting healthcare crisis that confronts Americans, a population health framework is viewed across constituencies as a promising solution for closing key gaps and improving economic viability of the healthcare delivery system. Population health is conceptualized as the distribution of health outcomes within a population, the health determinants that influence that distribution, and the policies and interventions that affect the determinants. It embraces a comprehensive agenda that emphasizes primary, secondary, and tertiary prevention, early detection of disease and early intervention. As a consequence, there is an increased focus on healthcare upstream (creating, shifting, and supporting conditions that promote health) and reduced need for specialty healthcare downstream. While there are many determinants that affect the health of a population, the ultimate goal for health care providers, public health professionals, employers, payers, and policymakers is improving the overall health of a population. To date, there has been no systematic and comprehensive discussion of what is being done to adapt to population healthcare within neuropsychology. This book's focus on population health neuropsychology emphasizes not just theory, but next steps for immediate implementation and considerations on future applications.