A New Framework for Reducing Healthcare Disparities

Despite decades of efforts to address healthcare inequities in the United States through programs and policies targeting social determinants of health, disparities persist across racial, gender, socioeconomic, and geographic lines. Systematic reviews of hospital systems’ initiatives and programs to address social determinants of health (SDOH) have revealed unsatisfactory progress. Some attribute the slow progress to insufficient standardization and sharing of learnings across communities, or the underinvestment in SDOH data and measurement.