The Role of Social Determinants of Health in Respiratory Care Disparities

Social determinants of health, such as environmental factors and socioeconomic status, play a key role in exacerbating health disparities within respiratory care, says Wanda Phipatanakul, MD, MS, professor of pediatrics, Harvard Medical School, director of the Clinical Research Center, Boston Children's Hospital.

This transcript has been lightly edited for clarity.

Transcript

What are some of the biggest health disparities that need to be addressed within respiratory care?

So that's a great question. There are a lot of health disparities, particularly in underserved populations. A lot of the work I do is in asthma, but there are disparities in many of the respiratory conditions. This spans across all ages, [from] kids to adults. One of the biggest challenges is there's a lot of challenges in really understanding the data in underserved populations, because many times they're underrepresented in many of the different programs and studies that we look at.

What role do social determinants of health play in exacerbating disparities, and how can they be addressed?

Social disparities, determinants of health, encompass many things. They're basically what we view as these differences that patients are exposed to through the environment, through financials, [and] socioeconomic factors that actually affect how long patients live, how they live, the type of health conditions they have, and so there are many different factors that all interplay into these [determinants]. Many of the things that I've been looking at have been modifiable risk factors, such as environmental risk factors, or things that are related to where people live, go to school, where they work, and how it can affect not only their current health, but even trajectory or even life expectancy as well.

How can community partnerships be leveraged to effectively address the health disparities faced by minority populations?

That's really important. I think really bridging all of the type of work that we do with the community, really going out into the community and getting the community to trust a lot of the work that we're doing can help bridge some of the gaps. We also try to focus on community-based participatory research, which is where you have the community involved in many of the programs or interventions or study designs, so that they feel empowered to have their voice heard and make a difference.

Many of the work projects that I do really are dependent on community buy-in. I've been working for the last 2 decades in the school communities, treating and helping underserved children understand why their asthma is so bad, what environmental exposures may be triggering some of their health disparities. So, really trying to level the playing field as much as possible by addressing these factors is really important.