Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
. 2022 Jul;10(3):e001732.
doi: 10.1136/fmch-2022-001732.

Medicalization of poverty: a call to action for America's healthcare workforce

Danielle D Jones  1
Affiliations

Medicalization of poverty: a call to action for America's healthcare workforce

Danielle D Jones. Fam Med Community Health. 2022 Jul.

Abstract

As a social determinant of health, poverty has been medicalised in such a way that interventions to address it have fallen on the shoulders of healthcare systems and healthcare professionals to reduce health inequities as opposed to creating and investing in a strong social safety net. In our current fee-for-service model of healthcare delivery, the cost of delivering secondary or even tertiary interventions to mitigate the poor health effects of poverty in the clinic is much more costly than preventive measures taken by communities. In addition, this leads to increasing burnout among the healthcare workforce, which may ultimately result in a healthcare worker shortage. To mitigate, physicians and other healthcare workers with power and privilege in communities systematically disenfranchised may take action by being outspoken on the development and implementation of policies known to result in health inequities. Developing strong advocacy skills is essential to being an effective patient advocate in and outside of the exam room.

Keywords: health equity; health workforce; healthcare disparities; social determinants of health.

PubMed Disclaimer

Conflict of interest statement

Competing interests: None declared.

References

    1. Macgregor G. Social determinants of health practices. Am J Public Health Nations Health 1961;51:1709–14. 10.2105/AJPH.51.11.1709 - DOI - PMC - PubMed
    1. Heiman HJ, Artiga S. Beyond health care: the role of social determinants in promoting health and health equity. Kaiser family Foundation, 2015. Available: https://www.kff.org/disparities-policy/issue-brief/beyond-health-care-th... [Accessed 02 Dec 2017].
    1. Daniel H, Bornstein SS, Kane GC, et al. Addressing social determinants to improve patient care and promote health equity: an American College of physicians position paper. Ann Intern Med 2018;168:577–8. 10.7326/M17-2441 - DOI - PubMed
    1. Gorski PA, Kuo AA, Granado-Villar DC. Community Pediatrics: Navigating the Intersection of Medicine, Public Health, and Social Determinants of Children’s Health. Pediatrics 2013;131:623–8.
    1. American Academy of Family Physicians . Social determinants of health policy, 2013. Available: https://www.aafp.org/about/policies/all/social-determinants.html [Accessed 04 May 2018].