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​More in this series:
Part 1: What Is Health Equity, and Why Does It Matter?
Part 2: Why Haven't We Made More Progress on Health Equity?
Part 3: Does Racism Play a Role in Health Inequities?
Part 4: How Can Providers Reduce Unconscious Bias?
Part 5: How Can Health Care Promote Health Equity?
Part 6: What One Thing Would You Do to Create Health Equity?
Part 7: Why Does Health Equity Matter to You?
Part 8: How Can Providers Help Create Health Equity?
IHI Open School Page
Why Does Health Equity Matter to You?
Don Berwick, MD, President Emeritus and Senior Fellow at IHI
Have trouble viewing this video? Read the transcript.
This is the seventh video in an 8-part series. Click here to watch the next video and learn about how providers create health equity.
Learning Objectives: At the end of this activity, you will be able to:
Describe what health care providers can and can't do to address patients' health needs.
Discuss a story of a patient who died young despite excellent health care.
Description: Don Berwick, MD, President Emeritus and Senior Fellow at IHI, sat down with David R. Williams, Professor of Public Health at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, to discuss health equity. In this video, Berwick explains why health equity matters to him and tells a story about how he was unable to save a patient from early death despite providing excellent clinical care.
Watch the full conversation on YouTube.
How do you define the term, "social justice"? Do you feel that social justice is part of the mission of health care?
What is your reaction to Berwick's story about the patient who he helped cure of leukemia but who died an early death anyway?
What do you think the story reveals about the health care system or society more broadly?
Why do you think the leukemia patient blamed himself? Do you think he was to blame or that disparities were to blame?
New to Activities
Re-envisioning Care for People with Involved Disabilities: Benefits and Challenges of Home-Based Primary Care
Providers and patients explore the importance of expanding primary care beyond the walls of the clinic, particularly when it comes to reaching people with involved disabilities.
What Is an Age-Friendly Health System?
The number of older adults, individuals age 65 and older, in the United States is growing rapidly. And as we age, care often becomes more complex. Health systems frequently are not prepared for this complexity, and older adults suffer a disproportionate amount of harm while in the care of the health system.
Re-envisioning Care for People with Involved Disabilities: Redesigning Primary Care
Anna, a woman who has become increasingly debilitated and isolated. The failure of the traditional medical system to respond to Anna's needs is contrasted with a team-based approach in which home-based primary care is combined with an array of critical services that address her medical, social, behavioral, and physical functioning needs.
Re-envisioning Care for People with Involved Disabilities: Creating Culture Change
Patients and providers share how the traditional medical model puts the clinician at the center, whereas the needs of a person living with disabilities is better met by an independent living model built around them. We'll explore how one practice infused the values and principles of independent living into daily practice by embedding them in hiring, orientation, training, and coaching.
Re-envisioning Care for People with Involved Disabilities: Shifting the Paradigm
People with involved disabilities share the barriers they face in accessing primary care in traditional settings. The foundation for building a primary care delivery system that is accessible and responsive, they'll explain, requires a different set of values.
Related IHI Open School Online Courses:
PFC 101: Dignity and Respect
TA 101: Introduction to Population Health
TA 102: Improving Health Equity
​Key Topics:
Triple Aim for Populations; Equitable Care Delivery;