Applying the Supersetting approach to tackle health inequities in disadvantaged settings

Applying the Supersetting-approach to tackle health inequities in disadvantaged settings

Inequity in health remains a major urgent global public health challenge, not least concerning noncommunicable diseases (NCDs) including type 2 diabetes (T2D). Peoples’ abilities to live long healthy lives is linked to their social and economic situation and living in disadvantaged neighbourhoods is associated with increased health risk across the life course and increased risk of T2D in adulthood. The risk of ill health is thus deeply rooted in the complex social contexts of people’s everyday lives. Thus, addressing the social determinants of health by incorporating a variety of strategies and interventions in the settings where people live is imperative to tackle health inequities. Evidence suggests that multilevel-multicomponent interventions can have a positive impact on a range of health and behavioural outcomes. Moreover, studies show that bottom-up approaches in community interventions constitute important drivers of collaborative action and sustainable solutions to inequity in health at a community level.
This workshop presents the Supersetting approach – an intervention strategy for comprehensive community interventions – as one solution to tackle growing health inequities in disadvantaged urban settings focusing on T2D. The approach strives to attain synergistic effects through coordinated engagement of multiple stakeholders in multiple settings to mobilize local resources and strengthen social networks for collective community action. The Supersetting approach has recently gained international recognition as a “a whole-of-society endeavor” approach to health promotion by welcoming complexity at all levels of the intervention.
The workshop uses Tingbjerg Changing Diabetes (TCD) a long-term community-based initiative, as a case to unfold the complexity and width of the Supersetting approach (www.tingbjergchangingdiabetes.dk). Beginning with an introduction and conceptualization of the Supersetting approach and characterization of the urban area of Tingbjerg focusing on T2D, we hereafter present three integrated TCD initiatives. These illustrate how the Supersetting approach can be applied in practice as well as how to explore and measure its different impacts through different methodological approaches.
The workshop aims to present and discuss the potentials and challenges of using a Supersetting approach to tackle inequalities in health in disadvantaged urban settings.

Main messages:
• The rising challenge of inequity in health calls for complex systems approaches.
• The Supersetting approach is presented as a sustainable complex systems approach to tackle growing health inequities in disadvantaged neighborhoods