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Social determinants of health Potential contributors to illness By Kate S. Erickson, MSW, and Christopher Reif, MD, MPH
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ur health is determined by social, economic, and environmental risks or opportunities. One person works at a desk; another works in a factory, where exposure to chemicals and risk of physical injury are routine. One person doesn’t think much about money; another budgets carefully for his five-person family, but comes up short and goes into debt to pay the food and electricity bills every month. One person lives in an updated 1960s style house; another rents an apartment with pest problems in a dilapidated building that is next to a contaminated field. Imagine the health outcomes of these different people. For each patient, there are numerous health determinants to consider, any one of which can impact patients’ ability to hear, understand, act on, and maintain health improvements.
Medical scribes A new job description By Alan J. Bank, MD
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lectronic medical records (EMRs) are now used in the majority of medical practices in Minnesota and across the United States. The use of EMRs offers a number of potential benefits to physicians including better remote access to patient records, more complete and readily obtainable information on
their patients, and the potential for improved quality of care. However, despite these real and/or potential advantages of EMRs, many physicians feel that EMRs worsen professional job satisfaction. Common sources of physician dissatisfaction Medical scribes to page 10
There are five generally recognized determinants of health (see the figure on page 15). Three of the five are considered social determinants of health (SDH): socioeconomic environment, physical environment, and health care (U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, “Healthy People 2020”). It is impossible Social determinants of health to page 14