Policy changes can be key to both transforming health in a community and helping to eliminate inequities. But when policies aren’t created or enforced with equity in mind, they may perpetuate these disparities – or even amplify them.
By Phillip Hughes and Tabitha L. Ostrout, HCA Healthcare Journal of Medicine, November 1, 2020 Background: Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs) have been shown to contribute to a litany of mental and physical health problems, including several chronic diseases and death, via a model known as the ACE pyramid. Many of the results of ACEs in the ACE pyramid are known contributors to poor perceived health, which has significant health implications. Despite these results, a possible link between...
Join us on Friday November 6, 2020 from noon to 1:00 PST as we come together and join Satya Chandragiri MD, Bonnie O’Hern RN, Denise PNP, & Michael Polacek RN for a discussion around the tender issue of suicide. Together we will discuss ways people and providers can support each other and encourage communities to take action to support one another around suicide prevention, crisis intervention, and the layers of culture and structural barriers to care. A special emphasis will be on...
By Dr Rebecca Lacey, October 29, 2019, ACAMH. Rebecca Lacey is a Senior Research Fellow in life course social epidemiology in the Department of Epidemiology and Public Health at University College London. Her research interests lie in the long-term health effects of early life adversities and effects of social relationships on health using longitudinal population datasets. When bad things happen to children, they can potentially have long lasting consequences throughout their lives – they...
An important report challenges California policy makers to move well beyond ACEs screening in order to achieve the state's "bold goal" of reducing exposure to childhood trauma. The report employs a broad social science framework to examine the sources of adversity in systemic racism, economic inequality, environmental hazards, and inadequate community resources to support community resilience.
In a conversational style, join physician Drew Factor who will speak with Dr. Tracy Gaudet, Liza Guroff and An é Watts in a discussion entitled "Reimagining Health Care". Dr. Gaudet will speak about her experience engaging in transformational change at the Veterans Administration and how this has shaped the development of her own Functional Medicine Institute , while Ms. Guroff and Ms. Watts will speak about their knowledge of a Trauma-Informed Approach both at a systems (National Council...
This post argues for the application of the social determinants frameworks to the problems of mental health. What this post misses or underemphasizes are the opportunities to change through social policy some of the social circumstances that help shape the likelihood of mental health challenges.
This blog post connects you to an important social science research report on the frequency of use in the media, state laws and regulations, and scientific research and writing of concepts such as childhood adversity, trauma-informed practice, toxic stress and ACEs. It also analyzes the impact of audiences of choosing one or another of these and other terms. It is well worth reading!
2018 NVDRS Restricted Access Database Now Available CDC has recently updated its Restricted Access Database (RAD) to include 2018 data from the National Violent Death Reporting System (NVDRS). The NVDRS RAD consists of data from 38 states, 21 California counties, the District of Columbia, and Puerto Rico. The NVDRS RAD is a de-identified, multi-state, case-level dataset comprised of hundreds of unique variables. The data set is available to researchers who meet specific criteria. The RAD...
By Samantha Hogan, October 14, 2020, The Maine Monitor. Gov. Janet Mills publicly called for a bipartisan effort to reform Maine’s defense system for poor people accused of crimes in response to an investigation by The Maine Monitor and ProPublica. Gov. Janet Mills of Maine publicly called for a bipartisan effort during the next legislative session to reform the state’s system for defending poor people accused of crimes in response to an investigation published by The Maine Monitor and...
Don't miss tomorrow's discussion on how to build equity into your network Networks are a way for people and organizations to come together to find solutions to complex problems. How can you create intentional partnerships that uphold the values, practices, and systems that support equity? Join our webinar tomorrow, October 20, to learn from Abby Charles, the program director for our partners at the Institute for Public Health Innovation, who will talk about the networked way of working and...
By October 5, 2020, Harvard Business Review. 2020 is the year the world’s attention turned to the deep fractures of our economic, political, educational, and healthcare systems. The year when status quo solutions were no longer good enough. For all the declarations of being “in this together,” the dual pandemics of Covid-19 and systemic racism have revealed how low-income communities and people of color are disproportionately left out, let down, and punished by our systems. The death of...
The Lancet: Public Health Published:September 21, 2020DOI: Chandni Maria Jacob, MSc : Despina D Briana, MD : Prof Gian Carlo Di Renzo, MD : Prof Neena Modi, FMedSci : Flavia Bustreo, MD : et al. Summary Resilient societies respond rapidly and effectively to health challenges and the associated economic consequences, and adapt to be more responsive to future challenges. Although it is only possible to recognise resilience retrospectively, the COVID-19 pandemic has occurred at a point in human...
This appeared in The Lancet on Sept 24, 2020: Summary The COVID-19 pandemic is an unprecedented global crisis. Many countries have implemented restrictions on population movement to slow the spread of severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 and prevent health systems from becoming overwhelmed; some have instituted full or partial lockdowns. However, lockdowns and other extreme restrictions cannot be sustained for the long term in the hope that there will be an effective vaccine or...
This correspondence appeared in THE LANCET on Sept 26th. The this is the concluding paragraph. " The Lancet deserves credit for drawing attention to the crucial need for the application of principles of the Black Lives Matter movement to the area of medical publications and for emphasising the need for representativeness of published research, commissioned authors, and profiled individuals to include minorities. Readers will be eager to see how The Lancet translates its anti-racism pledge...