The social determinants of health are economic and social factors like the neighborhood, physical environment, education, and employment that impact a person’s health. The purpose of the project is to raise awareness of the role social determinants of health play in Horizons for Homeless Children’s work and health in general. Understanding the social determinants of health will provide volunteers and staff with clearer insight of the difficulties children and families they support face. To this end, the researcher will explain each type of social determinants of health via presentation. The social determinants of health include homelessness, food insecurity, lack of education, medical care, neighborhood conditions, and many others.
During preparation of the presentation, the researcher used a number of sociologic articles to better understand the subject. For example, an article by Rybski and Israel (2017) helped understand the problems of homeless mothers, an article by Lathrop (2020) demonstrated how social determinants of health function. Meanwhile, Stafford and Wood (2017) argue how, because of social determinants of health, addressing homelessness is a form of healthcare. These publications allowed the researcher to put useful information about different social determinants of health onto corresponding slides.
Thus, the impact of social determinants of health on Horizons Children’s work will be explained to participants via presentation. Ideas for addressing these difficulties within the organization while serving reduced families will also be discussed in the session. Horizons for Homeless Children will benefit from the session by learning more about social determinants of health. The participants of the project will be able to identify possible solutions to social determinants of health in their community as they will have a better understanding of it.
References
Lathrop, B. (2020). Moving Toward Health Equity by Addressing Social Determinants of Health. Nursing for Women’s Health, 24(1), 36–44.
Rybski, D., & Israel, H. (2017). Impact of Social Determinants on Parent Sense of Competence in Mothers Who are Homeless or Poor Housed. Occupational Therapy in Mental Health, 33(4), 342–359.
Stafford, A., & Wood, L. (2017). Tackling Health Disparities for People Who Are Homeless? Start with Social Determinants. International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, 14(12), 1535.