Coral Health Launches First Cohesive Solution to Address DEI in Preventive Health

NEW YORK, Feb. 8, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- Coral Health today announces the launch of their distinctive and inclusive engagement platform, aimed at transforming how diverse communities access and engage with healthcare. As a first-to-market platform, Coral's mission is to integrate with employers' existing ecosystems and Employee Resource Groups (ERGs) to improve cultural fluency, health equity and long-term outcomes using culturally specific health education, activation, resources and care navigation plans.

Coral is partnering with mobile energy delivery service Booster, which delivers fuel to 500+ fleets nationwide, to bring Coral's full suite of services to nearly 1,000 Booster employees spanning their diverse corporate and field teams. Integrating Coral's health and wellness solutions with Booster's newly formed DEI affinity group infrastructure will support Booster in providing a more holistic health and wellness offering to its employees.

Diversity and inclusion efforts have become a focus for corporate growth, with reports showing a 107% increase in demand for Head of Diversity roles¹. Despite an emphasis on advancing DEI in the workplace, a large gap remains when it comes to addressing health education and equity. Today, just 47 percent of Black and 43 percent of Hispanic populations have employee sponsored health insurance compared with 66 percent of White Americans². People of color fare worse compared to their White counterparts due to historical inequities and contemporary injustices across a range of health measures, including infant mortality, pregnancy-related deaths, prevalence of chronic conditions, and overall physical and mental health status, with circumstances deteriorating further post-COVID-19³. Coral is helping to bridge this gap by taking a cohesive, culturally focused approach, with its platform drawing upon the deep experience of renowned public health, health equity, tech, antiracism, DEI and clinical experts. 

"There are many DEI solutions that target different and specific areas of the employee experience, but culture typically hasn't been addressed in employer-provided health and wellness solutions," said Hewett Chiu, CEO of Coral. "We want to reshape the conversation around health equity. We are partnering with employers to drive cultural fluency in their health and wellness services by creating inclusive engagement opportunities through health education, activations, healthcare resources and care plans tailored to meet unique racial, ethnic, and cultural needs."

Coral's culturally fluent platform is aimed at improving preventive care and health benefits utilization, equipping employees with relevant data and insights, and lowering employees' chronic care costs and outcome disparities. Coral's assessments and recommendations help organizations more effectively engage employees with their health and wellness by providing personalized, culturally specific health action plans and nuanced data insights. Additionally, Coral can supplement and integrate with existing benefit offerings, or act as a standalone offering. One of Coral's unique features is that it engages with employees in partnership with a company's ERGs and DEI strategic efforts. Once employees are part of the Coral platform, they can be directed to resources that help educate individuals on pressing health topics as it relates to their specific communities, including recommended healthcare plans based on culturally driven assessments and available employer benefits to facilitate treatment to remove accessibility barriers. Coral's platform supports individuals with their health and wellness journey through three core areas:

• Educate: 
• Live DEI-focused health workshops developed and facilitated by a diverse group of clinical and health equity experts.
• Activate: 
• Individual digital assessments of health status and perceptions using culturally led questions to gather insights by race/ethnicity to appropriately address the communities' health needs and provide custom health action plan recommendations.
• Coordinate:
• Deliver resources for screenings & vaccines, at home or privately at worksite, to relieve access barriers to treatment, especially for high-risk conditions with an initial focus on Black and Hispanic communities.

"It starts by building trust and health literacy in diverse communities so that all groups, including Black and Latino people who have been historically marginalized, have the informational power to engage in their health care more effectively and can achieve whole health and wellbeing," said Dr. Chris Pernell, Senior Advisor of Coral. "Information, access and social and structural barriers are not talked about enough and play an incredibly important role in the human healthcare experience. It's something we need to address if we're going to have a meaningful impact on reducing health inequity and dismantling racism."

Coral aims to humanize the health experience and engage diverse communities through culturally specific education, engagement and activation. By integrating more culturally nuanced information, data insights and personalized care navigation into a person's existing health and wellness benefits, Coral facilitates better, more inclusive health and wellness engagement and long-term outcomes. Coral was founded at Redesign Health, a company that powers innovation in healthcare.

About Coral
Coral was founded by a team of health equity, DEI and medical pioneers passionate about improving the health experience for diverse communities. Its culturally fluent health platform improves engagement and long-term outcomes of diverse communities through education, activation and healthcare resources tailored to meet unique cultural needs. Coral was founded in 2021 by Hewett Chiu, Patrick Wesonga and Sherry Wu at Redesign Health. For more information on Coral, please visit coralhealth.com.

About Redesign Health
Redesign Health powers innovation in healthcare by developing technologies, tools, and insights that lower the barriers to change across the industry.  Since 2018, exceptional founders have built over two dozen companies at Redesign Health impacting more than ten million lives across every aspect of the healthcare ecosystem including cancer care, teleaudiology, COVID-19 testing, metabolic reset and more. To learn more visit redesignhealth.com.

Contact:
Chelsea Harrison
Head of Communications, Redesign Health
[email protected]

Lance Buckley
Vice President, Media, Lippe Taylor
[email protected] 

Emma McCormick
Senior Account Executive, Media, twelvenote
[email protected] 

¹ _{https://www.linkedin.com/business/talent/blog/talent-acquisition/why-head-of-diversity-is-job-of-the-moment}

² _{https://www.kff.org/other/state-indicator/nonelderly-employer-coverage-rate-by-raceethnicity}

³ _{https://www.commonwealthfund.org/publications/scorecard/2021/nov/achieving-racial-ethnic-equity-us-health-care-state-performance}

SOURCE Coral Health