Michael Rodriguez
Professor: Nora Hernandez-Pupo
Population Health, Epidemiology, & Statistical Problems-DBX-DL01Course Code
07/16/2024
Health Equity
What is Health Equity?
Health equity is attaining the highest health level for everyone by identifying, understanding, and reducing or eliminating the health inequities stemming from social determinants of health like education, socioeconomic status, employment, and neighborhood and physical environment. Equity in health means that individuals should equally receive full health potential irrespective of their social position (Gómez et al., 2021). Health equity entails a wide range of considerations, including access to health care, availability of required resources, and quality of health care services delivered. Eliminating health inequalities and their systemic, preventable, and unfair factors is crucial to health equity advocacy.
Health Equity Framework
The health equity framework provides a systematic way to identify and understand the causes behind health inequity. It analyzes how social determinants create health disparity among different populations (Peterson et al., 2021). This framework usually builds around some essential elements, including structural determinants such as laws, policies, and economic systems affecting health; intermediate determinants of living conditions, psychosocial factors, and behavioral factors; and functions of health services concerned with access to affordable care quality. Embedded within this framework are processes for cross-sector collaboration, evidence-based decision-making, community stakeholder engagement, and policy work that has implications for systemic change.
Identify Individual and Institutional Actions to Improve Health Equity in Your Community
Improvement in health equity within communities calls for individual and institutional involvement. Individual engagement can include advocacy for policies related to fair health and community-based activities, such as support to organizations that seek to reduce health inequities. In addition, individuals can engage themselves and others in learning about the social determinants of health affecting them. Systemic change needs to happen at the institutional level through policy actions, for example, enactment of laws or other policies advancing equality in access to health, housing, education, and employment. For instance, Medicaid expansion may ensure that those living below the poverty line are better able to access healthcare. Policies that provide affordable housing also alleviate stressors and improve overall health. Health institutions can ensure equitable healthcare through culturally tailored care involving understanding patient needs (Chisolm et al., 2023). Collaboration between healthcare systems, community-based organizations, and public health agencies could help promote a more comprehensive attainment of health equity.
References
Chisolm, D. J., Dugan, J. A., Figueroa, J. F., Lane‐Fall, M. B., Roby, D. H., Rodriguez, H. P., & Ortega, A. N. (2023). Improving health equity through health care systems research.
Health services research,
58, 289-299.
https://doi.org/10.1111%2F1475-6773.14192
Gómez, C. A., Kleinman, D. V., Pronk, N., Gordon, G. L. W., Ochiai, E., Blakey, C., ... & Brewer, K. H. (2021). Addressing health equity and social determinants of health through healthy people 2030.
Journal of public health management and practice,
27(Supplement 6), S249-S257.
https://doi.org/10.1097/phh.0000000000001297
Peterson, A., Charles, V., Yeung, D., & Coyle, K. (2021). The health equity framework: a science-and justice-based model for public health researchers and practitioners.
Health promotion practice,
22(6), 741-746.
https://doi.org/10.1177%2F1524839920950730