Structural competency: new frameworks to understand and respond to inequities in health

Research on disparities in health and in medical care demonstrates that social, economic, and political inequities are key drivers of poor health outcomes. The influence of such inequities on health has long been noted by clinicians and public health practitioners, but such content has been incorporated unevenly into clinical training and clinical ethics. Recently proposed by clinicians, ethicists, and medical social scientists, the framework of "structural competency" offers a paradigm for training health professionals to recognize and respond to the impact of upstream, structural factors on patient health and health care. This lecture will cover key terms and primary domains of structural competency to allow medical practitioners, ethicists, and researchers to perceive and respond to social inequities in health in new ways.