The critical importance of capturing, evaluating, and integrating SDoH into the care continuum cannot be understated. Morning Consult notes that other research indicates that "80% of the factors that influence health outcomes occur outside the walls of hospitals and clinics," and that "social factors account for 25% to 60%" of U.S. deaths each year.

Here's what the system heavy hitters told Morning Consult on the subject of SDoH:

Organizations want data-driven SDoH insights. They are currently giving priority to data on substance abuse, language barriers, health literacy, geography, and income/transportation, in that order. So their priorities aren't in bad shape.

But nearly 7 of 10 are not deploying technology that would identify at-risk patients via SDoH, and about the same number aren't integrating medical and social data. Instead, they still depend upon information shared between provider and patient to check off these boxes, "and most are not focused on the technology needed to capture and use SDoH."

For instance:

• About half say theory planned to deploy "error-prone manual processes at the point of care" to gather the data.
• About a third say they'll invest in software to mine SDoH data to identify at-risk patients.
• Only 28% say they plan to integrate medical and social data.
• 83% exhibit a decided unreadiness "to capture and act on consumer-generated data" from wearables and other personal use technology.

The upshot: the tsunami of SDoH data that is about to slam into our health care providers will do more damage than good given the poor state of preparedness this study identified.

Related: Commercial health plan policies delay patient care, increase burnout: AHA

"The key to value-based care is the ability to integrate data from EHRs and other IT silos — clinical, claims, labs, pharmacy, telehealth, remote monitoring, social determinants, consumer generated, you name it — into a unified patient record that lets providers understand, report on, and foster the analytics-driven workflows, care management, risk stratification, and patient engagement strategies that drive better outcomes at lower costs, and meet contracted performance targets," the report says.

But that integration, according to the findings, may elude providers for years to come unless they step up their digital investments to take advantage of data that is already available – and would greatly improve health outcomes.