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In the US, a growing number of organizations and industries are seeking to affirm their commitment to and efforts around diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) as recent events have increased attention to social inequities. As health care organizations are considering new ways to incorporate DEI initiatives within their workforce, the anticipated result of these efforts is a reduction in health inequities that have plagued our country for centuries. Unfortunately, there are few frameworks to guide these efforts because few successfully link organizational DEI initiatives with health equity outcomes. The purpose of this chapter is to review existing scholarship and evidence using an organizational lens to examine how health care organizations can advance DEI initiatives in the pursuit of reducing or eliminating health inequities. First, this chapter defines important terms of DEI and health equity in health care. Next, we describe the methods for our narrative review. We propose a model for understanding health care organizational activity and its impact on health inequities based in organizational learning that includes four interrelated parts: intention, action, outcomes, and learning. We summarize the existing scholarship in each of these areas and provide recommendations for enhancing future research. Across the body of knowledge in these areas, disciplinary and other silos may be the biggest barrier to knowledge creation and knowledge transfer. Moving forward, scholars and practitioners should seek to collaborate further in their respective efforts to achieve health equity by creating formalized initiatives with linkages between practice and research communities.

The purpose of this paper is to introduce and discuss potential applications of emerging Building Information Model (BIM) and related technologies as applied to healthcare facilities. The paper presents example of applications of digital tools enabled by BIM that support more integrated outcomes for complex healthcare projects.

Paper formulation by a transdisciplinary author group with ideas and approaches developed through discussions and writing to explore future research directions. Initial ideas are supplemented by a literature review with examples introduced where relevant.

BIM as a front-end construction engineering tool is quite mature. Application of BIM and related tools to support complex healthcare at the precinct scale, for facilities management (FM), including improved user experience (UX) has been limited but shows great promise to support complex healthcare projects.

The research presented is limited and exploratory as it represents the first step by this group to investigate an integrated approach to digital healthcare design and FM.

The paper introduces the considerable benefits of BIM models, and related tools for FM and/or UX (both staff and patients) to save time, money and improves efficiency and accuracy in healthcare facilities.

The transdisciplinary author group brought broad perspectives to the potential benefits of combining accurate data-rich legacy building models with other digital tools for increased integration and co-ordination at all life stages of a healthcare precinct.

The Models of Child Health Appraised (MOCHA) project identified the different models of primary care that exist for children, examined the particular attributes that might be different from those directed at adults and considered how these models might be appraised. The project took the multiple and interrelated dimensions of primary care and simplified them into a conceptual framework for appraisal. A general description of the models in existence in all 30 countries of the EU and EEA countries, focusing on lead practitioner, financial and regulatory and service provision classifications, was created. We then used the WHO ‘building blocks’ for high-performing health systems as a starting point for identifying a good system for children. The building blocks encompass safe and good quality services from an educated and empowered workforce, providing good data systems, access to all necessary medical products, prevention and treatments, and a service that is adequately financed and well led. An extensive search of the literature failed to identify a suitable appraisal framework for MOCHA, because none of the frameworks focused on child primary care in its own right. This led the research team to devise an alternative conceptualisation, at the heart of which is the core theme of child centricity and ecology, and the need to focus on delivery to the child through the life course. The MOCHA model also focuses on the primary care team and the societal and environmental context of the primary care system.

This chapter summarises the role of EU actions in supporting healthcare policies in the EU Member States, both looking at implemented actions and describing current priorities for the future. It argues that these coordinated actions can be beneficial for EU Member States by helping them to avoid duplication of effort and to attain economies of scale. Moreover, data sharing with proper safeguards can unleash vast amount of ‘learning what works’ both for medical treatments and for healthcare sustainability measures. The need for this common learning appears ever more urgent while facing the health and economic consequences of the present pandemic.

The chapter summarizes key literature, including emerging ideas, that is pertinent to the question of how organizations and their leadership deal with and are resilient through crises – highlighting what works in surviving unexpected crises. The chapter presents an illustration of organizational response; it concludes with an analysis of what is missing from the literature and recommends a path forward to expanding actionable knowledge in this area. Multiple, interdependent factors that foster resilience are identified including (1) being sensitive to possible threats – even seemingly small failures, (2) not relying on simple interpretations of events but rather seeking diversity to create a complete view of the environment, (3) leadership that embraces communication, transparency, and continuous learning, (4) valuing expertise and allowing expert staff to make decisions during a crisis, and (5) a cultural commitment to a resiliency mindset that accepts failures as opportunities to learn and improve. Emerging concepts that may foster resilience but require more research include managing paradox, emotional ambivalence and diversity. Additional areas for fruitful research include: the impact of short-term versus long-term, or successive, crises; external versus internal shocks and the framing of the source of shocks; how crisis affect the pace of innovation and change; the role of diversity in organizational responses to crises; and a set of methodological opportunities to leverage natural experiments or simulations in ways that allow for longitudinal data illuminating the full cycle of crises across organizations from anticipation, to response, to longer-term adaptation to the new normal.

Given that the workforce constitutes a principal resource of primary care, appraisal of models of care requires thorough investigation of the health workforce in all Models of Child Health Appraised (MOCHA) countries. This chapter explores this in terms of workforce composition, remuneration, qualifications and training in relation to the needs of children and young people. We have focused on two principal disciplines of primary care; medicine and nursing, with a specific focus on training and skills to care for children in primary care, particularly those with complex care needs, adolescents and vulnerable groups. We found significant disparities in workforce provision and remuneration, in training curricula and in resultant skills of physicians and nurses in European Union and European Economic Area Countries. A lack of overarching standards and recognition of some of the specific needs of children reflected in training of physicians and nurses may lead to suboptimal care for children. There are, of course, many other professions that also contribute to primary care services for children, some of which are discussed in Chapter 15, but we have not had resources to study these to the same detail.

Organizations across industries are increasingly using Artificial Intelligence (AI) systems to support their innovation processes, supply chains, marketing and sales and other business functions. Implementing AI, firms report efficiency gains from automation and enhanced decision-making thanks to more relevant, accurate and timely predictions. By exposing the benefits of digitizing everything, COVID-19 has only accelerated these processes. Recognizing the growing importance of AI and its pervasive impact, this chapter defines the “social value of AI” as the combined value derived from AI adoption by multiple stakeholders of an organization. To this end, we discuss the benefits and costs of AI for a business-to-business (B2B) firm and its internal, external and societal stakeholders. Being mindful of legal and ethical concerns, we expect the social value of AI to increase over time as the barriers for adoption go down, technology costs decrease, and more stakeholders capture the value from AI. We identify the contributions to the social value of AI, by highlighting the benefits of AI for different actors in the organization, business consumers, supply chain partners and society at large. This chapter also offers future research opportunities, as well as practical implications of the AI adoption by a variety of stakeholders.