Moments of Misalignment: In the Space and Rhythms of Cancer Rehabilitation.

Background:Despite a tax-funded, needs-based organisation of the Danish health system,social inequality in cancer rehabilitation and palliative care (PC) has beennoted repeatedly. Little is known about how best to improve access andparticipation in cancer rehabilitation and PC for socio-economicallydisadvantaged and socially vulnerable patients.Aim:To gather, synthesise and describe practice-orientated development studiespresented in Danish-language publications and examine the underpinningconceptualisations of social inequality and vulnerability; explore relatedviews of stakeholders working in the field.Methods:The study comprised a narrative review of Danish-language literature onpractice-orientated development studies which address social inequality andvulnerability in cancer rehabilitation and PC and an online stakeholderconsultation workshop with Danish professionals and academics working in thefield.Results:Two themes characterise the included publications (n = 8):types of interventions; conceptualisations of social inequality andvulnerability; three themes were identified in the workshop data: focus andtype of interventions; organisation of cancer care; and vulnerability of thehealthcare system. The publications and the workshop participants(n = 12) favoured approaches which provide additionalindividualised resources throughout the cancer trajectory for this patientgroup. The terms social inequality and social vulnerability are largely usedinterchangeably, and associated with low income and no or little educationyet qualified with multiple descriptors, which reflect the diversesocio-economic situations professionals encounter in cancer patients andtheir psychosocial needs.Conclusion:Addressing social inequality and vulnerability in cancer rehabilitation andPC in Denmark entails practical and conceptual challenges. Of importance isindividualised support and the integration of rehabilitation and PC intostandardised care pathways. To conceive of social vulnerability as alayered, dynamic, relational and contextual concept reflects currentpractice in identifying the diversity of cancer patients who may benefitfrom additional support in accessing and participating in rehabilitation andPC.

Background: The impacts of health inequities on healthcare access, utilization, and outcomes have been highlighted by the COVID-19 pandemic, but these issues have been ongoing, yet understudied, in infectious disease epidemiology. Health inequities affect access to care, quality of care, and health outcomes in all healthcare settings. One healthcare setting that has yet to be fully studied in the context of health inequities is nursing homes. Nursing homes have a host of facility and population-specific issues that differ from other healthcare settings, making the impacts of health inequities likely unique and imperative to understand. The impacts of health inequities on nursing homes are unclear, and they likely have downstream effects on trends in morbidity, mortality, and transmission of multidrug-resistant organisms (MDROs) and other pathogens. Method: Here, we present a descriptive analysis, integrating multiple datasets relating to nursing home facility factors (data from the CMS Provider of Services and the CDC NHSN), nursing-home staffing trends (data from the CMS Payroll-Based Journal data), and social vulnerability (data from the CDC Social Vulnerability Index). We conducted a spatial analysis of nursing-home locations and the social vulnerability of the area. Results: Investigations of facilities and health inequities are best conducted in small spatial geographies. Analyses with less detailed spatial geographies miss high levels of heterogeneity in social vulnerability. Figure 1 provides an example, showing that analyzing nursing homes at a smaller spatial scale (ie, healthcare service area or HSA) shows heterogeneity in poverty levels that might be overlooked at a rough spatial scale, like Hospital Referral Regions (HRR). The poverty level associated with a nursing home will differ greatly depending on the geography of the analysis. Conclusions: These findings highlight that health inequities affect the quality and quantity of care of in nursing homes and that research conducted at larger geographical scales may overlook important mechanistic factors. This work will inform epidemiological models for disease transmission in nursing homes, accounting for the impacts of health inequities on transmission. Abating health inequities in all healthcare settings is a necessity to improve public health for the entire United States.Funding: NoneDisclosures: None

BackgroundData regarding the geographical distribution of cases and risk factors for COVID-19 death in children and adolescents are scarce. We describe the spatial distribution of COVID-19 cases and deaths in paediatric population and their association with social determinants of health in Brazil.MethodsThis is a population-based ecological study with a spatial analysis of all cases and deaths due to COVID-19 in Brazil among children and adolescents aged 0–19 years from March 2020 to October 2021. The units of analysis were the 5570 municipalities. Data on COVID-19 cases and deaths, social vulnerability, health inequities, and health system capacity were obtained from publicly available databases. Municipalities were stratified from low to very high COVID-19 incidence and mortality using K-means clustering procedures, and spatial clusters and relative risks were estimated using spatial statistics with Poisson probability models. The relationship between COVID-19 estimates and social determinants of health was explored by using multivariate Beta regression techniques.FindingsA total of 33,991 COVID-19 cases and 2424 deaths among children and adolescents aged 0–19 years were recorded from March 2020 to October 2021. There was a spatial dependence for the crude mortality coefficient per 100,000 population in the paediatric population aged 0–19 years (I Moran 0·10; P < 0·001). Forty municipalities had higher mortality rates, of which 20 were in states from the Northeast region. Seven spatial clusters were identified for COVID-19 mortality, with four clusters in the Northeast region and three in the North region. Municipalities with higher social inequality and vulnerability had higher COVID-19 mortality in the paediatric population.InterpretationThe main clusters of risk for mortality among children and adolescents were identified in municipalities in the North and Northeast regions, which are the regions with the worst socioeconomic indicators and greatest health disparities in the country. Our findings confirmed the higher burden of COVID-19 for Brazilian paediatric population in municipalities with higher social inequality and vulnerability and worse socioeconomic indicators. To reduce the burden of COVID-19 on children, mass immunisation is necessary.FundingNone.

Rehabilitation for cancer patients aims at reducing the impact of disabling and limiting conditions resulting from cancer and its treatment in order to enable patients to regain social integration and participation. Given current trends in cancer incidence and survival along with progress in medical treatment, cancer rehabilitation is becoming increasingly important in contemporary health care. Although not without limitations, the International Classification of Functioning, Disability and Health (ICF) provides a valuable perspective for cancer rehabilitation in understanding impairments in functioning and activity as the result of an interaction between a health condition and contextual factors. The structure of cancer rehabilitation varies across countries as a function of their healthcare systems and social security legislations, although there is a broad consensus with respect to its principal goals. Cancer rehabilitation requires a careful assessment of the individual patient's rehabilitation needs and a multidisciplinary team of health professionals. A variety of rehabilitation interventions exist, including psycho-oncological and psycho-educational approaches. Research on the effectiveness of cancer rehabilitation provides evidence of improvements in relevant outcome parameters, but faces some methodological challenges as well.

Rehabilitation for cancer patients aims at reducing the impact of disabling and limiting conditions resulting from cancer and its treatment in order to enable patients to regain social integration and participation. Given current trends in cancer incidence and survival along with progress in medical treatment, cancer rehabilitation is becoming increasingly important in contemporary healthcare. Although not without limitations, the International Classification of Functioning, Disability, and Health (ICF) provides a valuable perspective for cancer rehabilitation in understanding impairments in functioning and activity as the result of an interaction between a health condition and contextual factors. The structure of cancer rehabilitation varies across countries as a function of their health care systems and social security legislations, although there is a broad consensus with respect to its principal goals. Cancer rehabilitation requires a careful assessment of the individual patient's rehabilitation needs and a multidisciplinary team of health professionals. A variety of rehabilitation interventions exist, including psycho-oncological and psycho-educational approaches. Research on the effectiveness of cancer rehabilitation provides evidence of improvements in relevant outcome parameters, but faces some methodological challenges as well.

Attendance to health appointments may pose challenges to patients, especially when living in socially disadvantaged situations, with a fragile network. Inequality in health is increasingly highlighted in Denmark. To enhance social equity in health, a non-governmental organization introduced bridge-building, where healthcare students volunteer to accompany persons in socially vulnerable situations to health appointments. The purpose of the study was to explore what bridge-building entails and which gaps bridge-building attempts to span, in a welfare state, based on equal rights to healthcare.The study is based on an ethnographic fieldwork among the stakeholders in bridge-building, using interviews and participant observation in the form of “walking fieldwork”. Informants emphasized safe-making and wayfinding as important components in bridge-building, with bridge-builders acting as as-if-relatives. Bridge-building navigates in borderlands, the in-between spaces with fluid and contested borders, encompassing public, civic society, and family spheres. All informants emphasized that bridge-building covers a need in contemporary Danish healthcare. Bridge-building entails a double temporality, a here-and-now intervention where persons in vulnerable situations get social support to make it to health appointments, and a future investment in future health professionals’ understanding of vulnerability in lives and barriers to health access; insights that may be valuable in their future job positions.

A fundamental assumption behind cancer rehabilitation in many Western societies is that cancer survivors can return to normal life by learning to deal with the consequences of their illness and their treatment. This assumption is supported by increasing political attention to cancer rehabilitation and a growth in residential cancer-rehabilitation initiatives in Denmark (Danish Cancer Society 1999; Government of Denmark 2003). On the basis of their ethnographic fieldwork in residential-cancer rehabilitation courses, the authors examine the new rehabilitation discourse. They argue that this discourse has challenged the dominant illness narrative, "sick-helped-cured," producing a new narrative, "sick-helped-as if cured," and that this new narrative is produced and reproduced through technologies of power and of the self.

Few researchers have examined the organizational features of high-performing and low-performing hospitals for COVID-19 mortality during the pandemic, and how differences in hospital performance contributed to mortality disparities among socially vulnerable patients hospitalized with COVID-19. Our objectives were (a) to identify high- and low-performing hospitals on COVID-19 inpatient mortality and describe their distinguishing organizational characteristics, including nursing resources, and (b) to assess whether patients admitted to high-performing hospitals differed by social vulnerability level. This analysis used linked nurse survey, hospital, and claims data for 73,792 hospitalized older adults diagnosed with COVID-19 across 96 New York and Illinois hospitals between January 1, 2020, and December 31, 2020. A robust benchmarking approach was used to identify high- and low-performing hospitals on 30-day inpatient mortality. We computed the cumulative proportion of admissions for patients in the highest and lowest social vulnerability index quartiles to the hospitals ranked by performance. The average mortality rate in the high-performing hospitals was 16.2% compared to 31.5% in the low-performing hospitals. Compared to low-performing hospitals, high-performing hospitals had more favorable nurse work environments and lower patient-to-nurse ratios. About half the patients in the lowest social vulnerability quartile (least vulnerable) were admitted to hospitals in the top-performing tertile of hospitals compared to 38% of patients in the highest social vulnerability quartile (most vulnerable). Nursing resources were a central feature of a high-performing hospital for COVID-19 mortality during the early stages of the pandemic. Patients diagnosed with COVID-19 who were admitted from the most socially vulnerable communities were less likely to be admitted to high-performing hospitals. Increasing nursing resources-particularly in hospitals that serve socially vulnerable communities-could be a key strategy for preparing for future public health emergencies and addressing health disparities.

BackgroundHealth inequities impact healthcare delivery and outcomes, but the impacts of health inequities on antibiotic use and AR infections have been less frequently studied in nursing home residents. Nursing home residents are typically older, often have increased care needs requiring frequent contact with staff, and often have comorbidities or in-dwelling devices that make them vulnerable to infection. The community served by a nursing home may play a role in frequency and variability in antibiotic use, as health inequities may impact healthcare delivery and health status of patients, since both patients and caregivers are likely to be drawn from the surrounding community. We hypothesize that antibiotic use in nursing homes is impacted by the social vulnerability of the surrounding community.MethodsWe collected all reports of the proportion of residents who received antibiotics in the previous 7 days in 2019, which are reported monthly to the CMS Minimum Data Set. We assessed the proportion of facility residents using antibiotics by social vulnerability measures (from CDC Social Vulnerability Index) of the surrounding healthcare-seeking community (Hospital Service Areas from Dartmouth Health Atlas), using a hierarchical model to control for facility factors.ResultsWe find considerable variability in antibiotic use across 14,908 US nursing homes (Figure 1A). After controlling for facility characteristics, facilities located in areas of greater community-level social vulnerability were associated with higher antibiotic use (Figure 1B).Figure 1. Antibiotic use in nursing homes and relationships with community social vulnerability. A) The distribution of the proportion of patients using antibiotics within the previous 7 days by facility.B) Coefficient estimates of a multilevel regression model. Controlling for facility-level factors (blue), community-level social vulnerability index appears to be related with more antibiotic use.ConclusionThese findings indicate that community social vulnerability is associated with healthcare delivery within facilities. This association may result from differences in antibiotic prescribing behavior, infection prevention practices, or from disparity-driven differences in the health status of the resident population. This work is important for informing epidemiological models within healthcare facilities: failing to include heterogeneity of the surrounding community could bias transmission models and decrease the accuracy of targeted public health interventions to vulnerable facilities and communities.DisclosuresAll Authors: No reported disclosures.

Black/African American women in the United States are more likely to live in neighborhoods with higher social vulnerability than other racial/ethnic groups, even when adjusting for personal income. Social vulnerability, defined as the degree to which the social conditions of a community affect its ability to prevent loss and suffering in the event of disaster, has been used in research as an objective measure of neighborhood social vulnerability. Black/African American women also have the highest rates of hypertension and obesity in the United States. The purpose of this study was to examine the relationship between neighborhood social vulnerability and cardiovascular risk (hypertension and obesity) among Black/African American women. We conducted a secondary analysis of data from the InterGEN Study that enrolled Black/African American women in the Northeast United States. Participants' addresses were geocoded to ascertain neighborhood vulnerability using the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's Social Vulnerability Index at the census tract level. We used multivariable regression models to examine associations between objective measures of neighborhood quality and indicators of structural racism and systolic and diastolic blood pressure and obesity (body mass index > 24.9) and to test psychological stress, coping, and depression as potential moderators of these relationships. Seventy-four percent of participating Black/African American women lived in neighborhoods in the top quartile for social vulnerability nationally. Women living in the top 10% of most socially vulnerable neighborhoods in our sample had more than a threefold greater likelihood of hypertension when compared to those living in less vulnerable neighborhoods. Objective neighborhood measures of structural racism (percentage of poverty, percentage of unemployment, percentage of residents >25 years old without a high school diploma, and percentage of residents without access to a vehicle) were significantly associated with elevated diastolic blood pressure and obesity in adjusted models. Psychological stress had a significant moderating effect on the associations between neighborhood vulnerability and cardiovascular risk. We identified important associations between structural racism, the neighborhood environment, and cardiovascular health among Black/African American women. These findings add to a critical body of evidence documenting the role of structural racism in perpetuating health inequities and highlight the need for a multifaceted approach to policy, research, and interventions to address racial health inequities.

Background A limited ability to identify social vulnerability and community resilience at local scales has been recognised as a critical barrier to both climate adaptation and health risk assessment and planning. This study aims to assess multidimensional social vulnerability to the health impacts of climate change across communities in Australia, quantify its contribution to health inequalities, and identify key drivers of health vulnerability. Methods Informed by a scoping review and the WHO Social Determinants of Health Equity framework, we compiled area-level data from multiple sources on 61 social vulnerability indicators, subsumed under 27 subdomains and 8 domains (demographic profile, economic security, residential environment, infrastructure and services, social stability and community support, population health, governance and policies, climate knowledge and awareness). These indicators were used to construct a Social Vulnerability Index for the Health Impact of Climate Change (SVI-HICC) and scores in each domain. We used dominance analyses to identify the strongest predictors of vulnerability, examined inequalities in mental, physical, and social health associated with extreme weather and climate events across the vulnerability distribution, and tested the capacity of SVI-HICC to predict adverse health outcomes following climate-related extreme events in comparison to alternative social indices. Findings Spatial mapping showed that high vulnerability was clustered in regional and remote areas, with pockets of moderate vulnerability in urban areas. People living in high vulnerability areas experienced significant health losses from weather and climate disaster, this was not seen for people in low vulnerability areas. Infrastructure and services, economic security, and residential environment were identified as the most influential domains contributing to social vulnerability, primarily driven by access to healthcare services, area disadvantage, dwelling condition, and housing precarity. Interpretation An area-level assessment of multi-dimensional social vulnerability makes visible how social and structural determinants contribute to health inequalities in climate change. Such insights can inform climate adaptation policies that are equity-oriented and context-sensitive.

There is emerging evidence that a significant proportion of migrants acquire HIV after arrival in Europe. Thus, to strengthen prevention efforts, it is crucial to understand migrants’ vulnerability to HIV/AIDS. This article contributes to this understanding by analysing the perspectives of prevention actors and migrants. Data were collected through a qualitative and participative research study conducted in Switzerland. Twenty prevention actors and 28 migrants participated in in-depth interviews. Results show that migrants’ difficulties in accessing and adopting measures to prevent HIV are related to three types of situational vulnerability that increase their vulnerability to HIV/AIDS: social vulnerability, which refers to social inequalities in access to care; relational vulnerability, which refers to unequal distribution of power within intimate relationships; and sexual vulnerability, which refers to stigmatization of sexualities that some people may consider as socially nonconforming. For HIV/AIDS prevention to be successful among migrants, power structures such as sexism, heterosexism, cisgenderism, ethnocentrism, and racism need to be addressed. Reducing stigma related to HIV among migrants requires a struggle against these power structures as well as health inequities.

BackgroundPatients with SLE experience substantial health disparities. Studying the effect of spatial context on health outcomes has become a focus in health disparities research. The CDC Social Vulnerability Index (SVI)...

Cancer rehabilitation is an important but often underutilized treatment in the comprehensive care of the cancer patient. Cancer patients have varying levels of access to rehabilitation services. Acute inpatient, inpatient consultation-based, and outpatient-based cancer rehabilitation services have been described in the literature. We will discuss acute inpatient cancer rehabilitation and some of its outcomes at the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston, TX, which is the only national comprehensive cancer center to have its own acute inpatient rehabilitation unit dedicated solely to cancer patients. We retrospectively reviewed the inpatient medical records of consecutive inpatients admitted to the acute inpatient cancer rehabilitation unit from September 2008 to August 2009 for the following information: patient age, sex, primary tumor type, rehabilitation diagnoses, length of stay, discharge destination, and payer source. From September 2008 to August 2009, the physical medicine and rehabilitation service at MD Anderson Cancer Center had 1098 inpatient consultations, of which 427 patients were admitted to the inpatient rehabilitation unit with a mean length of stay of 11 days. Of the 427 patients, 73 (17%) were patients with primary neurologic-based tumor, 71 (16%) were patients with hematologic-based tumors, 48 (11%) were sarcoma patients, 35 (8%) were gastrointestinal tumor patients, 27 (6%) were head and neck tumor patients, 25 (6%) were prostate and bladder cancer patients, 24 (6%) were lung cancer patients, 22 (5%) were melanoma patients, 20 (5%) were breast cancer patients, 15 (4%) were renal cancer patients, 14 (3%) were gynecologic cancer patients, and 53 (12%) were patients with other types of cancer. Of the 427 patients admitted to acute inpatient rehabilitation at MD Anderson Cancer Center, 324 (76%) were discharged home, 72 (17%) went back to acute care service, 15 (4%) were sent to a skilled nursing facility, 9 (2%) were discharged to palliative care, and 5 (1%) were discharged to a long-term acute care facility. An active inpatient rehabilitation unit within a national comprehensive cancer center receives referrals from patients with a wide variety of tumor types and is able to successfully discharge home 76% of its patients.

BackgroundVaccination reduces the overall burden of COVID-19, while its allocation procedure may introduce additional health inequality, since populations characterized with certain social vulnerabilities have received less vaccination and been affected more by COVID-19. We used structural equation modeling to quantitatively evaluate the extent to which vaccination disparity would amplify health inequality, where it functioned as a mediator in the effect pathways from social vulnerabilities to COVID-19 mortality.MethodsWe used USA nationwide county (n = 3112, 99% of the total) level data during 2021 in an ecological study design. Theme-specific rankings of social vulnerability index published by CDC (latest data of 2018, including socioeconomic status, household composition & disability, minority status & language, and housing type & transportation) were the exposure variables. Vaccination coverage rate (VCR) during 2021 published by CDC was the mediator variable, while COVID-19 case fatality rate (CFR) during 2021 published by John Hopkinson University, the outcome variable.ResultsGreater vulnerabilities in socioeconomic status, household composition & disability, and minority status & language were inversely associated with VCR, together explaining 11.3% of the variance of VCR. Greater vulnerabilities in socioeconomic status and household composition & disability were positively associated with CFR, while VCR was inversely associated with CFR, together explaining 10.4% of the variance of CFR. Our mediation analysis, based on the mid-year data (30th June 2021), found that 37.6% (mediation/total effect, 0.0014/0.0037), 10% (0.0003/0.0030) and 100% (0.0005/0.0005) of the effects in the pathways involving socioeconomic status, household composition & disability and minority status & language, respectively, were mediated by VCR. As a whole, the mediation effect significantly counted for 30.6% of COVID-19 CFR disparity. Such a mediation effect was seen throughout 2021, with proportions ranging from 12 to 32%.ConclusionsAllocation of COVID-19 vaccination in the USA during 2021 led to additional inequality with respect to COVID-19 mortality. Viable public health interventions should be taken to guarantee an equitable deployment of healthcare recourses across different population groups.