Welcome to the Structural Determinants of Health Resource Guide. This guide is created by SMU's Structural Determinants of Health Curricular Integration Task Force in 2018 to highlight resources on this topic. This group has intentionally combined the theory social determinants of health and the structural competency framework.
Social Determinants of Health
These inequities in health, avoidable health inequalities, arise because of the circumstances in which people grow, live, work, and age, and the systems put in place to deal with illness. The conditions in which people live and die are, in turn, shaped by political, social, and economic forces (World Health Organization (WHO) Commission on the Social Determinants of Health, 2008).
Structural competency is a new framework for understanding and responding to the inequalities that make individuals and populations sick. This framework analyzes institutional and structural hierarchies and discrimination in order to confront the ways these lead to sickness and disease, (Structural Competency Working Group, 2016).
SMU's Structural Determinants of Health Curricular Integration Task Force members: Brandy Beazley, Leia Casey, Miriam Eisenhardt, Susan Forsyth, Marjorie Hammer, Mary McCall, Uzo Nwankpa, Shirley Strong, and Cynthia Stacy.