Social Determinants of Health Practices

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Abstract
This paper is based on the Great Plains Health Study conducted in Kit Carson County, Colorado. It is concerned with individual and community behavior related to health and illness and the town and county social structure for planning in organization of local public health services. Learned psychological and social forces, accentuated by the hardships of adapting to a semi-arid environment, influence individuals in part to seek medical care in order to return to the performance of their work and social roles. Provision by the county of personal preventive health services, except for children, is not seen as necessary. Strategically located large towns are displacing the small intermediate villages as trade and service centers of the locale of the medical power structure in the county. Instead of the present part-time county sponsored health officer and nurse, future public health organization could be more effectively organized on a State-county axis with the supervisory public health officer at the State level and a broadly trained, full-time health worker in this and similar Plains counties. The county worker could more easily reach all families of the county by effectively working through the medical group, hospital and social institutions of the large town and service center.

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