Dean Ramos Discusses Role of Nurses in Addressing Social Determinants of Health
At a webinar on November 30, Dean Vincent Guilamo-Ramos addressed how nurses will impact the future of health care and the role of nurses in addressing pressing health and social challenges. His presentation, “Social Determinants of Health,” was the first in the 2021-22 Dean’s Lecture Series and builds upon the Fall 2021 Building Upon Excellence event series geared toward alumni and friends.
At a webinar on November 30, Dean Vincent Guilamo-Ramos addressed how nurses will impact the future of health care and the role of nurses in addressing pressing health and social challenges. His presentation, “Social Determinants of Health,” was the first in the 2021-22 Dean’s Lecture Series and builds upon the Fall 2021 Building Upon Excellence event series geared toward alumni and friends.
Vincent Guilamo-Ramos, PhD, MPH, LCSW, RN, ANP-BC, PMHNP-BC, AAHIVS, FAAN, dean, Duke School of Nursing, and vice chancellor of nursing affairs, Duke University, was introduced by Karin Reuter-Rice, PhD, CPNP-AC, FCCM, FAAN, associate professor and chair of the Faculty Governance Association. More than 175 people attended from across the U.S. and Mexico, and the event was offered with simultaneous interpretation in Spanish.
Ramos addressed factors related to social determinants of health, including structural production of risks, environmental effects, influences that manifest throughout the course of a life, biological embedding, intergenerational consequences, and social injustices and structural racism. Ramos emphasized the important role of nurses in affecting change to improve health outcomes. “We need to think about how we integrate social determinant principles into a framework that distinguishes nurses as being leaders in identifying effective ways of being able to address social determinants,” he said.
“The vast majority of health care across the world is delivered by nurses,” Ramos said. “We have clinical care expertise. We are comfortable working in decentralized and centralized care context. We are experts at coordination of care. We are really clear about whole person perspectives to health. We are comfortable with location or flexibility. We are the right workforce to significantly advance social determinants of health (SDOH), now and in the future.”
In this presentation, Ramos presented a toolbox to illustrate approaches to structural, psychosocial and biomedical/clinical interventions—and a call to action to successfully position nurses as leaders in addressing social determinants of health.
Available resources include: