Los Angeles County Public Health Department Partners With OpenEvidence to Bring Local Health Guidance to Physicians
The Los Angeles County Department of Public Health (DPH) has announced a new collaboration with OpenEvidence, an artificial intelligence-powered clinical decision support platform, to help physicians access local public health guidance more efficiently while searching for clinical information.
The partnership is designed to connect healthcare professionals with official Los Angeles County public health resources at the moment they are researching specific medical conditions and public health concerns. Through the collaboration, physicians in Los Angeles County who search OpenEvidence for selected public health topics may see relevant, location-specific messages from the Los Angeles County Department of Public Health.
These messages are intended to guide clinicians toward local resources, alerts and recommended actions involving reportable diseases, outbreaks and other time-sensitive public health issues. By integrating local guidance into an existing clinical information workflow, the collaboration aims to make important public health information easier for physicians to discover and act upon.
The initiative reflects the growing role of digital platforms and artificial intelligence in helping clinicians navigate increasingly complex healthcare information. Physicians often need to balance clinical decision-making with reporting obligations, outbreak notifications and public health requirements. Access to timely and relevant local guidance can help bridge the gap between general medical information and the specific actions required within a particular jurisdiction.
Connecting Clinical Searches With Local Public Health Action
When physicians search for information about conditions such as measles, tuberculosis or other reportable diseases, they may need more than general information about symptoms, diagnosis and treatment. Depending on the condition and the circumstances, clinicians may also need to know whether a case must be reported, which local public health department should be contacted, what procedures apply and whether an outbreak or health alert is currently active.
The new collaboration is intended to help make those local connections more visible.
Under the partnership, OpenEvidence will display relevant Los Angeles County Public Health messages when physicians search the platform for selected public health topics. These messages can connect clinicians to official local resources and provide access to additional information related to public health alerts and reportable conditions.
The goal is not to replace clinical judgment or existing public health processes. Instead, the initiative is designed to make authoritative local information easier to find within the clinical workflow.
“Physicians often need local public health guidance at the same moment they are working through a clinical challenge,” said Barbara Ferrer, PhD, MPH, MEd, director of the Los Angeles County Department of Public Health. “This collaboration helps bring LA County resources closer to that decision point. A search about measles, TB, or any other reportable condition should not end only with general information but connect to the next step. We want that action to be easy to find and easy to take.”
The statement highlights an important challenge facing healthcare professionals: finding the right information at the right time. A physician may be familiar with the clinical characteristics of a disease but still need jurisdiction-specific guidance regarding reporting, public health response or local recommendations.
By placing local information closer to the point of clinical research, the partnership aims to reduce the time and effort required to find that guidance.
Addressing the Challenge of Information Overload
Healthcare professionals operate in an environment where medical information is constantly expanding. Clinical guidelines, research studies, regulatory updates and public health recommendations are published across numerous websites and platforms.
While the availability of information can support better decision-making, it can also make it difficult for clinicians to quickly locate the most relevant resource. Local health departments may publish important guidance, but physicians may not always know where to look for it or may not encounter it during their clinical research.
This creates a communication challenge for public health organizations. Health departments invest significant resources in developing guidance, alerts and educational materials, but ensuring that healthcare professionals see that information at the right time can require additional outreach.
OpenEvidence is designed to support physicians as they search for medical information. The collaboration with Los Angeles County Public Health provides a way to place relevant local messages within that information-seeking process.
“Local health departments produce some of the most actionable information in the country, and while they spend a tremendous amount of time and resources developing the right guidance, they often have to dedicate considerable extra effort to bring that guidance to the attention of clinicians,” said Travis Zack, MD, PhD, chief medical officer at OpenEvidence. “Working with LA County allows us to add practical help when physicians need it, without requiring additional searching.”
The approach is intended to reduce the number of steps physicians must take to find local information. Rather than completing a separate search for a public health department website after researching a disease, clinicians may be directed to relevant local resources as part of the same workflow.
Supporting Reportable Disease Response
Reportable diseases are a key area of focus for the collaboration. Healthcare professionals are often required to notify public health authorities when they identify or suspect certain diseases. These reporting requirements allow health departments to monitor disease activity, investigate potential outbreaks and coordinate appropriate responses.
Timely reporting can be particularly important for diseases that spread rapidly or require immediate public health intervention. Conditions such as measles and tuberculosis can require coordinated action involving healthcare providers, laboratories, public health officials and affected communities.
The ability to connect physicians with local information during the clinical research process may help improve awareness of the steps associated with these conditions.
The collaboration may also support access to information about outbreaks and time-sensitive health alerts. When public health conditions change rapidly, clinicians may need current information that is specific to their geographic area.
A physician treating a patient in Los Angeles County may need different reporting instructions or local resources than a physician practicing in another state or jurisdiction. Location-specific information can therefore be highly valuable in supporting appropriate action.
Artificial Intelligence in the Clinical Information Workflow
The partnership also demonstrates how artificial intelligence is increasingly being used to support healthcare professionals. AI-powered platforms can help clinicians navigate large amounts of medical information and identify relevant resources more efficiently.
In this collaboration, the technology is being used to connect clinical searches with official public health guidance. The objective is to make the process of finding local information more seamless.
The value of such a system depends heavily on the quality and authority of the information being surfaced. By connecting physicians with official resources from the Los Angeles County Department of Public Health, the initiative emphasizes the importance of authoritative public health information.
The partnership represents a model in which technology can support communication between public health agencies and healthcare professionals. Rather than relying exclusively on traditional email alerts, newsletters or separate website searches, public health messages can be incorporated into a digital clinical information environment.
This approach may become increasingly relevant as healthcare organizations continue to adopt technology designed to support clinical decision-making.
Building on Previous Public Health Collaboration
The Los Angeles County initiative builds on OpenEvidence’s previous experience delivering public health messaging to physicians through a partnership with the New York City Department of Health and Mental Hygiene.
That earlier experience provides a foundation for expanding the approach to another major public health system. Los Angeles County represents a large and complex healthcare environment with a diverse population and an extensive network of healthcare providers.
The county’s healthcare landscape includes hospitals, physician practices, clinics, laboratories and other healthcare organizations. Coordinating public health communication across such a broad system can be challenging.
Digital platforms may provide an additional channel for reaching physicians with information relevant to their clinical work. The collaboration with OpenEvidence is intended to support this broader effort by making selected public health resources more visible within physician searches.
Strengthening Public Health Preparedness
The collaboration comes as Los Angeles County continues efforts to strengthen routine and emergency public health readiness.
Public health preparedness involves the ability to respond effectively to infectious disease outbreaks, emerging health threats and other events that may affect communities. Healthcare providers play an important role in this preparedness system because they are often among the first professionals to identify potential cases or unusual patterns of illness.
Ensuring that clinicians can quickly access current public health guidance may help support a coordinated response.
During an infectious disease outbreak, for example, physicians may need information about testing, reporting, infection control, vaccination or other public health recommendations. The relevance of such guidance can change as new information becomes available.
A digital system that helps connect clinicians with local resources may provide an additional way to improve access to that information.
Evaluating the Initiative and Future Opportunities
Los Angeles County DPH and OpenEvidence plan to evaluate the collaboration as it develops. The evaluation will help the organizations refine future messages and identify additional areas where local public health guidance could be made easier for physicians to find.
This evaluation process may provide insights into which topics generate the greatest need for local guidance and how clinicians interact with public health messages presented through clinical information platforms.
The organizations may also be able to identify opportunities to expand the range of topics covered by the collaboration. Future areas could include additional reportable diseases, emerging outbreaks or other public health issues requiring timely communication with healthcare professionals.
The ability to evaluate the initiative is an important part of its development. By assessing how physicians engage with local messages, the organizations can determine how the model can be improved and potentially expanded.
Improving Access to Trusted Information
At its core, the collaboration is focused on improving the connection between physicians and trusted public health information.
Healthcare professionals need access to reliable information when making decisions about patient care. In some situations, that information must also be specific to the local community and current public health environment.
A national medical resource may explain the clinical characteristics of measles or tuberculosis, but local public health guidance may provide additional information about reporting procedures, active alerts and community-specific recommendations.
The partnership between the Los Angeles County Department of Public Health and OpenEvidence is designed to bring those two types of information closer together.
By making local public health resources more visible within clinical searches, the collaboration may help physicians move more quickly from identifying a potential health concern to finding the appropriate next step.
A Technology-Enabled Approach to Public Health Communication
The partnership illustrates a broader shift in how public health organizations communicate with healthcare professionals. Digital tools are increasingly being explored as ways to deliver important information more efficiently and at the point where it is most relevant.
For public health departments, the challenge is not only producing accurate guidance but also ensuring that clinicians can find it when they need it. For physicians, the challenge is navigating a growing volume of information while managing time-sensitive clinical responsibilities.
Technology can help address both challenges by connecting authoritative public health resources with the workflows healthcare professionals already use.
The collaboration between LA County DPH and OpenEvidence represents one example of this approach. By integrating selected local public health messages into a clinical decision support platform, the initiative seeks to improve access to information about reportable diseases, outbreaks and other urgent public health matters.
As the program develops, its evaluation may help determine how similar partnerships can support public health communication in other jurisdictions.
Ultimately, the collaboration reflects the increasing importance of connecting healthcare delivery and public health through digital technology. When physicians can more easily access relevant local guidance, they may be better positioned to take appropriate action on conditions that affect both individual patients and the broader community.
For Los Angeles County, the partnership provides another tool for strengthening communication with clinicians across its large healthcare system. For OpenEvidence, it expands the role of its platform in supporting public health messaging.
Together, the organizations are working to create a more direct connection between clinical information searches and local public health action. As healthcare and public health systems continue to adopt artificial intelligence and digital decision-support tools, initiatives such as this could play an increasingly important role in improving the speed, visibility and accessibility of critical health guidance.
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