{"id":17758,"date":"2023-08-07T12:30:45","date_gmt":"2023-08-07T17:30:45","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.osfhealthcare.org\/blog\/?p=17758"},"modified":"2023-08-07T12:34:29","modified_gmt":"2023-08-07T17:34:29","slug":"tackling-social-factors-that-impact-health","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/osf-blog.live.imagescape.com\/blog\/tackling-social-factors-that-impact-health\/","title":{"rendered":"Tackling social factors that impact health"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>If you made a list of actions that lead to a healthy life, it would probably include eating the right foods, exercising regularly and getting plenty of <a href=\"https:\/\/www.osfhealthcare.org\/blog\/four-steps-to-help-you-sleep-better\/\">sleep<\/a> each night.<\/p>\n<p>But the factors that determine your health actually go beyond simple dos and don\u2019ts. For many people, non-medical factors that are out of their control make healthy living more difficult.<\/p>\n<h2>Social drivers of health<\/h2>\n<p>These factors are called social drivers (or determinants) of health. The <a href=\"https:\/\/health.gov\/healthypeople\/priority-areas\/social-determinants-health\">U.S. Department of Health &amp; Human Services<\/a> defines them as \u201cconditions in the environments where people are born, live, learn, work, play, worship and age that affect a wide range of health, functioning and quality-of-life outcomes and risks.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>They include:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Access to education, food, housing and transportation<\/li>\n<li>Financial resource strain<\/li>\n<li>Social connections to family, friends and other acquaintances<\/li>\n<li>Physical activity<\/li>\n<li>Safety and domestic violence<\/li>\n<li>Stress<\/li>\n<li>Depression, including <a href=\"https:\/\/www.osfhealthcare.org\/blog\/postpartum-symptoms-whats-normal-and-what-not-to-ignore\/\">postpartum<\/a><\/li>\n<li>Alcohol and tobacco use<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Statistics show that 60%-80% of an individual\u2019s health outcomes are determined by these drivers. And according to the latest U.S. census, 10%-22% of Americans are negatively impacted by them.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt wasn\u2019t until recently that these factors were considered part of health care providers\u2019 area of responsibility,\u201d said Sarah Stewart de Ramirez, MD, medical director of Population Health Services at OSF HealthCare. \u201cBut we started to see a shift with the implementation of the Affordable Care Act as there was recognition that more needed to be done to keep folks healthy. It started to shift focus outside doctors\u2019 offices into the communities where people live.\u201d<\/p>\n<h2>Asking the right questions<\/h2>\n<p>In 2017, OSF HealthCare began studying ways to screen patients for social drivers of health. And in 2019, the Ministry first implemented screening measures at <a href=\"https:\/\/www.osfhealthcare.org\/locations?query=primary\">OSF Medical Group \u2013 Primary Care<\/a> clinics. At these locations, patients are asked to take a few minutes to answer questions on a tablet to identify social factors they\u2019re facing. OSF then connects them to helpful resources.<\/p>\n<p>These screenings have included questions like:<\/p>\n<p>In the past year \u2026<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Have you been unable to pay for utilities when they were really needed?<\/li>\n<li>Have you found that the food you bought just didn\u2019t last and you didn\u2019t have money to get more?<\/li>\n<li>Has lack of transportation kept you from medical appointments or from getting medications?<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>\u201cAnd now, we\u2019re expanding our efforts and working to offer a standard screening process and questions in all areas of OSF that have contact with patients,\u201d said Brandi Clark, vice president of Digital Care at OSF HealthCare. \u201cThis includes hospitals and doctors\u2019 offices as well as all of our OSF OnCall digital program offerings.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>OSF is also working to create additional partnerships with community organizations to develop solutions for social drivers of health most prevalent in given areas. All of this will provide a more holistic, coordinated approach to patient care resulting in better health outcomes.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cOSF has always been focused on serving the community,\u201d Dr. Stewart de Ramirez said. \u201cBut we\u2019re now approaching it with the same scientific methods that we use in clinical medicine. This enables us to understand upstream factors that could be causing someone\u2019s illness, whether that be lacking money to buy food, lacking transportation for doctor\u2019s appointments, suffering from alcoholism or domestic violence, etc.\u201d<\/p>\n<h2>Awareness driven by COVID-19<\/h2>\n<p>OSF was well on its way toward this approach when COVID-19 arrived in 2020. The pandemic drew national attention to social drivers of health and shined a light on health disparities and inequities they cause.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThat\u2019s when the health care industry as a whole realized that the status quo wasn\u2019t acceptable,\u201d Dr. Stewart de Ramirez said. \u201cThese drivers must be measured and addressed, which allows us to truly provide whole-person care.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThis is now our standard of care just like screening for breast cancer and other illnesses. Federal and state governments and insurance companies are also requiring health systems to take action, so this isn\u2019t a \u2018nice to have\u2019 thing or \u2018icing on the cake.\u2019 It\u2019s front and center.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>OSF plans to launch this new approach to social drivers of health in 2024.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>If you made a list of actions that lead to a healthy life, it would probably include eating the right foods, exercising regularly and getting plenty of sleep each night. But the factors that determine your health actually go beyond simple dos and don\u2019ts. For many people, non-medical factors that are out of their control [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":119,"featured_media":17766,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"no","_lmt_disable":"no","footnotes":""},"categories":[129],"tags":[1010],"coauthors":[1034],"class_list":["post-17758","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-miscellaneous","tag-social-determinants-of-health"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v25.1 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Tackling social factors that impact health<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Non-medical factors outside of a person&#039;s control can make healthy living difficult. 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