By: Jennifer Schleman, Assistant Vice President, Marketing & Communications

At its quarterly meeting earlier this week, the National Health Council (NHC) Board of Directors approved the organization’s new Strategic Plan. The plan, which covers 2022 to 2024, will guide the NHC into its second century as the leading voice for patients with chronic conditions and disabilities, and as a convener and resource for a diverse membership of nearly 150 national patient advocacy organizations and partners.

“The Strategic Planning Committee and the Board of Directors are confident this plan will help guide the NHC in support of its mission to provide a united voice for the 160 million people living with chronic diseases and disabilities and their family caregivers,” said LaVarne Burton, co-chair of the Strategic Planning Committee, NHC Chair Elect, and President and Chief Executive Officer of the American Kidney Fund.

In developing the Strategic Plan, stakeholder outreach and input was a critical component of this process, and feedback from a series of individual interviews, focus groups, and surveys conducted during the summer and fall directly informed the development of the plan. Input came from a cross-section of NHC members at all organizational levels and from peer organizations in the nonprofit sector.

Lines of inquiry focused on health care trends, potential areas of focus for the strategic plan, and how stakeholders engage with the NHC. Peer benchmarking addressed practices such as membership, branding, funding, and managing challenges associated with being an advocacy organization. In the aggregate, more than 1,200 individuals representing more than 100 organizations contributed insights. Thanks to all of you who participated.

Based on this feedback, the Strategic Planning Committee and NHC staff identified four key areas of strategic focus as well as an operational area of focus:

• Advance health ecosystem policy reforms to optimize patient health.
• Support patient-centricity in decisions affecting patient health.
• Prioritize health equity across the health ecosystem.
• Amplify patient group impact in the health ecosystem.
• Build the NHC’s capacity to best achieve its mission and vision.

For each area of focus, the NHC developed goals to make an impact. View the Strategic Plan here.

In addition to Burton, other members of the Strategic Planning Committee were:

• Susan Sherman of the LAM Foundation, co-chair
• Matt Eyles of America’s Health Insurance Plans (AHIP)
• Steve Gibson of the Lupus Foundation of America
• Diana Gray of the Hydrocephalus Association
• Gary Puckrein of the National Minority Quality Forum