Teaching About Health Disparities Using a Social Determinants Framework

The intersection of two trends in health intervention has the potential to fundamentally change the practice of medicine. First, research into the social determinants of health is revealing the mechanisms by which living conditions cause disease. Second, the restructuring of primary care around preventive interventions represents the convergence point of medicine and public health. These trends have profound implications for medical education. Whereas traditional educational paradigms favor a “bottom-up” approach to disease—focusing on molecular origins or organ systems—new paradigms must emphasize the entire causal chain of ill health to facilitate the understanding of novel interventions available to tomorrow’s clinician.