Toney K, Ballard E, Duch J, Zuniga C, Gore R, Castaneda A, Dapkins I, Roy B
Tributary Design, Boston, MA, United States.
Brown School at Washington University in St. Louis, St. Louis, MO, United States.
Front Public Health. 2025 Jun 4;13:1585633. doi: 10.3389/fpubh.2025.1585633. eCollection 2025.
The underlying drivers and outcomes of social determinants of health are dynamically complex, making it difficult to design effective responses. This complexity has inspired a growing number of calls to move beyond mechanistic thinking and use systems science to engage directly with complexity and highlight opportunities for methodological innovation to enhance translation of insight into real world action. This case study describes a methodological innovation combining community-based system dynamics and design thinking to understand multi-level complexity of a public health challenge: optimizing the design of a community-clinical linkage in Brooklyn, New York. In-depth description of the case illustrates methods integration and resulting insights and recommendations. Results from the case demonstrate that integrating methods generates insight at multiple levels, including connecting holistic system understanding to individual experiences of system structure and operationalizing and translating insights into action. Combining community-based system dynamics and design thinking holds value for intervention planning, strategic implementation, and sustaining change.
健康的社会决定因素的潜在驱动因素和结果动态复杂，难以设计出有效的应对措施。这种复杂性促使越来越多的人呼吁超越机械思维，运用系统科学直接应对复杂性，并突出方法创新的机会，以加强将见解转化为实际行动。本案例研究描述了一种方法创新，将基于社区的系统动力学和设计思维相结合，以理解公共卫生挑战的多层次复杂性：优化纽约布鲁克林社区与临床联系的设计。对该案例的深入描述说明了方法整合以及由此产生的见解和建议。该案例的结果表明，整合方法能在多个层面产生见解，包括将整体系统理解与个体对系统结构的体验联系起来，以及将见解转化为行动并付诸实施。将基于社区的系统动力学和设计思维相结合，对干预规划、战略实施和维持变革具有价值。
