Working To Understand The Role Of Social Determinants Of Health For Minority And Vulnerable Communities In The United States

摘要

Assessing social determinates of health is critical for predicting how environmental contaminants influence health outcomes. To this end five NIH-EPA Centers of Excellence on Environmental Health Disparities Research are working to understand the role of social determinants of health in toxicologic responses to environmental exposures. The Centers are located in distinct areas of the United States and represent a diversity of races and ethnicities, urban and rural communities, environmental contaminants, and health outcomes of concern. This diversity enables a comparative assessment of key social determinants across multiple exposure-outcome relationships among "minority" populations. The Centers are working together and using available data to determine similarities and distinctions between these partnering communities and the US population. Comparative results of key socio-economic and demographic variables will be summarized cartographically and tabularly. Examining the representativeness of Environmental Health Disparity Center partner communities provides a basis for generalization of results, improves our understanding of the key factors affecting exposure-response assumptions, and broadens the reach of results in informing health policy.