Centering Health Equity Through the Social Determinants of Health, Interprofessional Education, and Sustainable Partnerships With Historically Black Colleges and Universities: Envisioning Upstream and Downstream Impacts.

The social determinants of health (SDOH) framework identifies barriers to health care, education, financial stability, and other conditions that exist across socially determined parameters, often to the detriment of Communities of Color. Postsecondary healthcare students must be aware of these disparities. In order to address upstream and downstream healthcare equity, the SDOH framework must be leveraged as a cross-disciplinary curricular innovation to support interprofessional education. Historically Black Colleges and Universities have unrealized potential to develop extraordinary healthcare leaders; partnerships integrating SDOH can be a powerful force to advance health equity in the United States.

No Health Equity Without Diversity: Strengthening Nursing Programs in Historically Black Colleges and Universities.

In April 2022, Adtalem Global Education sponsored a virtual summit entitled Advancing Equity in Healthcare, in which several of the authors of this article and other prominent health-care professionals examined the need to diversify the health-care profession. Topics included educational justice and its impact on health care, the business case for transforming and advancing health equity, and addressing systemic inequities and improving health outcomes for historically marginalized persons. The summit inspired the authors to write this paper to advocate for authentic, sustainable partnerships led by Historically Black Colleges and Universities, as a means to diversify nursing leadership and to stem systemic and structural inequities in health care.

Promoting health equity with HBCUs: Breaking away from structural racism.

BACKGROUND: The United States continues to be plagued with pervasive health disparities. Leading health and professional organizations acknowledge structural racism as a contributing factor for the lack of a racially diverse nursing workforce particularly those serving in leadership roles which could help to mitigate health disparities among historically stigmatized populations. PURPOSE: Purpose Lack of funding for Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs) and lack of meaningful partnerships, stymie efforts that can be made by nursing programs at HBCUs. DISCUSSION: Discussion This position paper examines collaborative actions that can address upstream factors that perpetuate healthcare disparities through deep engagement between the policymakers, professional associations, industry, and educational institutions. METHODS: Faculty representing HBCU's and predominately White institutions, professional organizations, and staff met via videoconference to refine the focus of the paper, determine topic areas for writing teams, and refine details which occurred during weekly meetings. CONCLUSION: To disengage from structural racism, three critical recommendations are amplified with associated examples.

Transforming Social Determinants to Educational Outcomes: Geospatial Considerations.

In recovering from one of the worst educational crises in recorded history due to the pandemic, in a mission to rebuild and become more resilient, there has been a heightened urgency to provide resources to communities most in need. However, precisely identifying those needs have become all the more important due to the increase in popularity of e-learning as a suitable option and the improvement of technologies. Most notably, socially disadvantaged and historically marginalized communities were disproportionately and severely impacted by several aspects of the pandemic, in terms of health, economics, access to education, and sustainable well-being. This differential effect was modeled spatially with the combination of aerial photogrammetry, traditional geospatial mapping, and other robust AI-driven techniques to synthesize and analyze the various types of data. In this original research study, we apply various spatial health variables, relate them to educational variables in an initial empirical process of understanding how to address equity-related considerations from the context of the learner's experience, providing the empirical evidence for the development of locally tailored learner support and assistance, meeting students where they are by specifically identifying and targetting geographically underserved areas. We found that there were clear statistically significant relationships between educational attainment and several physical (p < 0.001), mental (p = 0.003), access to healthy food/food security (p < 0.001), and uptake of preventative health measures (p < 0.001), which also varied geographically. Geographic variations in learning experiences demonstrates the unquestionable need to understand a variety of physical, mental, and dietary factors surrounding the student's success. Understanding a combination of these factors in a geospatial context will allow educational institutions to best serve the needs of learners.

Mindfulness-based cognitive therapy for children and adolescents with anxiety disorders at-risk for bipolar disorder: A psychoeducation waitlist controlled pilot trial.

AIM: Previous studies suggest that Mindfulness-Based Cognitive Therapy for Children (MBCT-C) is feasible and may improve anxiety and emotion regulation in youth with anxiety disorders at-risk for bipolar disorder. However, controlled studies are warranted to replicate and extend these findings. METHODS: In the current study, 24 youth with anxiety disorders who have at least one parent with bipolar disorder participated in a MBCT-C treatment period (n = 24; Mage = 13.6, 75% girls, 79% White) with a subset also participating in a prior psychoeducation waitlist control period (n = 19 Mage = 13.8, 68% girls, 84% White). Participants in both the waitlist and MBCT-C periods completed independently-rated symptom scales at each time point. Participants in the waitlist period received educational materials 12 weeks prior to the beginning of MBCT-C. RESULTS: There were significantly greater improvements in overall clinical severity in the MBCT-C period compared to the waitlist period, but not in clinician- and child-rated anxiety, emotion regulation or mindfulness. However, increases in mindfulness were associated with improvements in anxiety and emotion regulation in the MBCT-C period, but not the waitlist period. CONCLUSIONS: Findings suggest that MBCT-C may be effective for improving overall clinical severity in youth with anxiety disorders who are at-risk for bipolar disorder. However, waitlist controlled designs may inflate effect sizes so interpret with caution. Larger studies utilizing prospective randomized controlled designs are warranted.