Health Equity & Cultural Competency

Build Organizational Capacity

Organizations can engage in practices that influence their impact on health equity. Practices such as staff training, resource distribution, and staffing decisions impact public health.

Community Engagement

Involve community members in health initiatives to foster relationships, improve assessment efforts, build capacity to positively affect the community, and enhance sustainability.

Establish & Foster Partnerships

Engage a diverse sector of partners to collectively achieve equitable outcomes by leveraging diverse skills and expertise.

Understand Health Equity

Understand inequities that exist to establish baselines, monitor trends over time, inform partners where to focus resources, and ensure strategies address the needs of populations experiencing health inequities.

Health Equity-Focused Evidence-Based Strategies

Ensure strategies have a deliberate focus on health equity and include supportive activities to address barriers or unintended outcomes underserved populations may face.

Evaluation

Focus on health equity in evaluation efforts and use culturally appropriate tools and methodologies. Health equity-oriented evaluation can reveal trends in health inequities.

Think Cultural Health

U.S. Department of Health and Human Services
Note: You must log in or register to take this continuing education course
Continuing education for health care administrators and providers; disaster and emergency personnel; nurses and social workers; oral health professionals; and physicians, nurse practitioners, and physician assistants

Moving to Institutional Equity: A Tool to Address Racial Equity for Public Health Practitioners

National Association of Chronic Disease Directors (NACDD) Health Equity Council
This health equity toolkit has been created by the Institutional Equity Committee, a subgroup of the NACDD Health Equity Council, to help identify biased practices and policies. It is being piloted in 9 states.

Roots of Health Inequity

The Roots of Health Inequity is an online learning collaborative. The site offers a starting place for those who want to address systemic differences in health and wellness that are actionable, unfair, and unjust. As a participant in the learning collaborative, you will have a chance to explore concepts and strategies by working through five critical questions.

Achieving Health Equity

 This course presents education on how to identify and eliminate health disparities in your organization. It will help your organization prioritize the elimination of disparities as a cross-cutting initiative to improve the quality of care for the individuals and families in your community.

Poverty Simulation: SPENT Training Challenge

SPENT helps people understand the challenges and trade-offs faced by individuals with low socio-economic status.

National Standards for Culturally and Linguistically Appropriate Services in Health Care
U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS)

View the National CLAS Standards

Rationale and Benefits

Organizations and individuals are at various levels of awareness, knowledge, and skill acquisition along the cultural competency continuum. Completing self-assessments offers many benefits, including monitoring how effectively you are addressing the needs and preferences of culturally/linguistically diverse groups, improving family/client utilization of services, and individual strengths and areas for growth. Self-assessments are a tool, not a test, and should be used to help you consider your own skills, knowledge, and awareness in your interactions with others. https://nccc.georgetown.edu/assessments/rationale.php

Test your cultural competency

• Promoting Cultural Diversity & Cultural Competency: Self-Assessment Checklist

Additional Resources

• HHS: Think Cultural Health
• NACDD: Health Equity Resources/Tools
• ASTHO: Health Equity & Social Determinants of Health

South Dakota Resources:

• South Dakota Helpline Center
• Feeding South Dakota
• Great Plains Tribal Chairmen's Health Board
• Lutheran Social Services of South Dakota
• South Dakota Department of Social Services
• SDSU Extension

Meetings

December 9, 2022:  Agenda  |  Minutes

August 26, 2022:  Agenda  |  Minutes

Organizations

• Avera Health
• Black Hills Special Services Cooperative
• City of Sioux Falls Health Department
• Disability Rights of South Dakota
• Helpline Center
• Horizon Health Care
• Indian Health Services
• Lutheran Social Services
• Monument Health
• Pennington County Health & Human Services
• Sanford Health
• South Dakota Association of Healthcare Organizations
• South Dakota Council of Community Behavioral Health
• SD Department of Education
• SD Department of Health
• SD Department of Labor & Regulation
• SD Department of Social Services
• SD Department of Transportation
• SD Department of Tribal Relations
• SD Department of Veterans Affairs
• South Dakota Sheriff's Association
• South Dakota State University Extension
• Wellmark Blue Cross Blue Shield
• WIC Breastfeeding Peer Counselor Program