Prepare

 The SDH journey starts with preparing yourself, your colleagues and your staff.

Why Address the Social Determinants of Health in Daily Clinical Practice?

Social and economic factors can have an overwhelming effect on health. You may ask what you can actually do to address issues like poverty and violence that patients may be experiencing. The good news is that embedding SDH in your practice is a long-term process, and there is wealth of evidence-based and “real life” practice experience to guide you, lots of it available on this site.

This 10-minute video for primary care providers is a good start. It gives a great overview of what you can expect. You can also review and share this more in-depth module on ​Poverty and Health: Key Issues in Patient Care.

You may wonder how you are going to fit this all into an already busy appointment schedule, and what you will do with the information you’re given.

PRAPARE The US-based Protocol for Responding to and Assessing Patients’ Assets, Risks, and Experiences) outlines a process for establishing equity-oriented care, including ways to gather, assess and respond to social determinants of health data Practice Coaches will help explain how to engage staff and patients in this new approach to care.

Establish goals and priorities

What are the key issues you and your colleagues want to address when you embed this new “SDH” orientation into your practice? A facilitated conversation with staff and possibly some patients will help identify the key issues to prioritize.

  • Contact your Practice Coach through your Division of Family Practice to host this conversation.
  • Review PRAPARE’s advice to Engage Key Stakeholders.

Further reading

A research team in BC and Ontario – EQUIP – found four issues that consistently helped further health equity:​​

  • Trauma and violence-informed care
  • Contextually-tailored care
  • Culturally safe care
  • Harm reduction

The EQUIP materials referred to in this website provide further information on these issues and approaches to dealing with them.

The College of Family Physicians of Canada’s “Caring for Unattached and Marginalized Patients” issue of their Innovation in Primary Care publication contains a wealth of information that may also be useful to you in preparing to embed SDH in your practice.