Becker’s Healthcare Podcast Advancing Health Equity Through Community Driven Care at Cone Health with Olu Jegede, MD
Feb 13, 2026
Olu Jegede, MD, Senior VP and Chief Health Equity and Community Impact Officer at Cone Health and clinician in sickle cell care. He discusses community-driven programs like CATCH 5 in 5, blood pressure equity efforts, measurable early outcomes, scaling access in high-need neighborhoods, embedding equity into culture, and the challenge of sustaining equity investments amid financial pressures.
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Place-Based Life Expectancy Target
- Cone Health's CATCH 5 in 5 aims to raise life expectancy by five years in targeted zip codes within five years.
- The program uses community-driven screenings and place-based interventions to address medical and non-medical drivers of health.
Early Community Screening Lowers Acute Utilization
- Community-based screenings and addressing non-medical drivers can shift care earlier and reduce complications.
- Cone Health observed double-digit drops in non-emergent ED visits and fewer admissions and readmissions.
Pharmacy-Led Blood Pressure Turnaround
- Cone Health ran a blood pressure equity program that raised control in the hypertensive population from 64.9% to 70.5%.
- A community-based pharmacist subset improved control from about 7% to 63% in assigned patients.