The Social and Structural Determinants of Health

Gain the knowledge and skills you need to promote equity in health care! Focused on what nurses can do to address health disparities, The Social and Structural Determinants of Health: Educating Nurses to Advance Health Equity provides a comprehensive look at how factors such as income, education, and race can lead to systemic disadvantage in health and well-being. It shows how nurses can partner with communities and organizations to understand the root causes of inequities in health, develop equity-minded skills, and take action to advance long-lasting progress. Written by Teri A. Murray, a noted nursing educator with rich expertise in health equity, this text makes it easy to learn and apply the principles that can lead to better health outcomes and healthier communities. Coverage of the social determinants of health (SDOH) addresses the environmental conditions in which people are born, live, learn, work, play, worship, and age, and how these conditions lead to systemic disadvantage in health and all aspects of life. Descriptions of the health disparities seen in marginalized and minoritized populations include structural determinants such as the distribution of wealth, power, social and cultural norms, and economic and political factors. Context for the health disparities seen at the population level includes both structural and social determinants. Consistent format of chapters includes a chapter overview, learning objectives, Reflection questions, a case study or community-based experience, and more. Unit I of the book includes five chapters patterned after the framework used by Healthy People 2030: Social Determinants of Health, with a sixth chapter on the historical context of race and racism in health and how it is an underlying factor for the inequities that lead to health disparities. Chapters in Unit II provide strategies and approaches that nurses can employ to advance health equity.