May Research Round-Up

See below for a selection of publications recently added to the SIREN Evidence & Resource Library. As always, if you are aware of resources you think should be added to the Library please send them our way.

Food insecurity
Washington State's Fruit and Vegetable Prescription Program: Improving Affordability of Healthy Foods for Low-Income Patients
J. Marcinkevage, A. Auvinen, & S. Nambuthiri
Preventing Chronic Disease
In the first two years of a statewide food prescription program, $154,810 in fruit and vegetable prescriptions were redeemed (54.4% redemption rate) and 88.2% of program participants surveyed reported eating more fruits and vegetables than previously as a result of the prescription.

Food for Thought: A Qualitative Evaluation of Caregiver Preferences for Food Insecurity Screening and Resource Referral
D. Cullen, M. Attridge, & J.A. Fein
Academic Pediatrics
In this qualitative study, food insecure caregivers of pediatric patients reported comfort with food insecurity screening. Use of resources was influenced by how caregivers prioritized food among other stressors and how they perceived their level of need relative to others.

Electronic Medical Record-Based Referrals to Community Nutritional Assistance for Food-Insecure Patients
K. Hager, A. De Kesel Lofthus, B. Balan, & D. Cutts
Annals of Family Medicine
This case study describes a health system's EHR-integrated food insecurity screening and resource referral program in which a referral order is auto-faxed to staff at a partner food bank and referred patients receive individualized, over-the-phone enrollment in nutrition programs and community food resources.

Housing insecurity
Homeless Shelter Entry in the Year After an Emergency Department Visit: Results From a Linked Data Analysis
K.M. Doran, E. Johns, M. Schretzman, et al.
Annals of Emergency Medicine
In this New York City-based study, 5.0% of urban ED patients who were not currently homeless entered a homeless shelter within the year after their ED visit. This finding suggests that ED patients may benefit from efforts to identify housing instability and to direct them to homelessness prevention programs.

Transportation access
The Public Health Case for Addressing Transportation-Related Barriers to Care
C. Henning-Smith
American Journal of Public Health
This commentary argues that while transportation-related barriers to health care are important to address, transportation barriers to accessing other community resources are just as pressing.

Intimate partner violence
Health Care Practitioners' Responsibility to Address Intimate Partner Violence Related to the COVID-19 Pandemic
N.L. Bradley, A.M. DiPasquale, K. Dillabough, & P.S. Schneider
Canadian Medical Association Journal
In this commentary, the authors describe the increased risk of IPV due to COVID-19-related isolation, call for greater health care-based IPV screening and support, and provide several Canadian program implementation resources.

Women's Experiences of Screening for Intimate Partner Violence in the Health Care Setting
N.P. Correa, C.M. Cain, M. Bertenthal, & K.K. Lopez
Nursing for Women's Health
Among IPV survivors participating in this qualitative study in Houston, TX, many reported that they were not screened for IPV by health care professionals. Those who were screened did not feel they were effectively screened.

Assessing the Veterans Health Administration's Response to Intimate Partner Violence Among Women: Protocol for a Randomized Hybrid Type 2 Implementation-Effectiveness Trial
K.M. Iverson, M.E. Dichter, K. Stolzmann K, et al.
Implementation Science
This published protocol describes the planned evaluation of the VA’s nationwide implementation of IPV screening programs in primary care clinics.

Social isolation
The Health Care System is an Untapped Resource in Combating Social Isolation and Loneliness in Older Adults
D.G. Blazer, & L. Marsh Ryerson
Health Affairs Blog
The authors of this blog post summarize key recommendations from a recent NASEM report on health care approaches to tackling social isolation and loneliness in older adults.

Intervention to Reduce Perceived Loneliness in Community-Dwelling Older People
R. Rodríguez-Romero, C. Herranz-Rodríguez, B. Kostov, J. Gené-Badia, & A. Sisó-Almirall
Scandinavian Journal of Caring Sciences
Older adults with moderate loneliness in Barcelona, Spain benefitted from an intervention developed by primary care practices and CBOs that combined educational workshops, mindfulness, yoga, walking, and visits to urban gardens.

Access to nature
Nature-Based Social Prescribing in Urban Settings to Improve Social Connectedness and Mental Well-being: A Review
M.A. Leavell, J.A. Leiferman, M. Gascon, et al.
Current Environmental Health Reports
This review identified some of the pathways through which nature-based social prescribing could increase social connectedness and influence physical health and mental well-being.

Screening for Park Access during a Primary Care Social Determinants Screen
N. Razani, D. Long, D. Hessler, G.W. Rutherford, & L.M. Gottlieb
International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health
Approximately 17% of caregivers of pediatric patients screened for social determinants reported lacking park access but few cited it among their top 3 needs; families experiencing competing needs (e.g. housing, food, and employment insecurity) were less likely to prioritize park access.

Community health worker interventions
Deploying Community Health Workers to Support Medically and Socially At-Risk Patients in a Pediatric Primary Care Population
S. Stiles, R. Thomas, A.F. Beck, et al.
Academic Pediatrics
CHWs embedded into pediatric primary care identified 264 previously-unknown challenges likely contributing to preventive care non-adherence. This included 92 challenges related to food insecurity, 60 to housing instability, and 112 to transportation challenges. Early learnings from this model highlight the importance of outreach processes, trusted relationships, and alignment with community partners.

Safe Start Community Health Worker Program: A Multisector Partnership to Improve Perinatal Outcomes Among Low-Income Pregnant Women With Chronic Health Conditions
S.D. Cunningham, V. Riis, L. Line, et al.
American Journal of Public Health
A community health worker program among publicly insured pregnant women with chronic health conditions was associated with improved engagement in care, reduced antenatal inpatient admissions, and shorter neonatal intensive care unit stays.

Medical-Legal Partnerships
Medical-Legal Partnerships: 11 Years' Experience of Providing Acute Legal Advice for Critically Ill Patients and their Families
C.A. Eynon, L.J. Robinson, & K.M. Smith
Journal of the Intensive Care Society
This paper describes a hospital-based medical-legal partnership in the UK, which was used by 551 families over 11 years.

Medical-Legal Partnerships: A Scan of the Landscape and a Look Forward
K. Spangler
Texas Medical-Legal Partnership Coalition
This report summarizes existing research regarding effectiveness of the MLP model and the experience of attorneys working in MLPs, and discusses challenges and future directions for this model.

Screening practices
Differences in Pediatric Residents' Social Needs Screening Practices Across Health Care Settings
A. Vasan, C.C. Kenyon, & D. Palakshappa
Hospital Pediatrics
Pediatric residents were more likely to screen for unmet social needs in outpatient than inpatient care despite reporting similar barriers to screening (time constraints, lack of knowledge about available resources, and discomfort with screening questions) in both settings. Residents were also more likely to screen when questions were embedded in the EHR.

Health care–CBO coordination
Disconnected Relationships between Primary Care and Community-Based Health and Social Services and System Navigation for Older Adults: A Qualitative Descriptive Study.
R. Valaitis, L. Cleghorn, J. Ploeg, et al.
BMC Family Practice
Providers in urban primary care clinics and health and social services organizations in Ontario, Canada described the challenges they faced trying to coordinate services for older adults.

Risk adjustment
Incorporating Machine Learning and Social Determinants of Health Indicators into Prospective Risk Adjustment for Health Plan Payments
J.A. Irvin, A.A. Kondrich, M. Ko, et al.
BMC Public Health
This paper describes how incorporating SDH indicators in a prospective risk adjustment model reduced underpayment in several vulnerable populations.