We advance the standard that equitable outcomes must be designed into systems — measured, proven, and sustained — not assumed.
A standards and advocacy organization working at the intersection of health equity, social drivers of health, and social prescribing.
Equity cited but not operationalized is not equity at all.
Equity By Design Inc. works across three interconnected domains where the design gap shows up most persistently — and where a shared standard would change outcomes.
Health equity is cited in nearly every public health strategy document. It is rarely measured after deployment. We advance the standard that equitable outcomes must be built into health and social systems from the start — across infrastructure, data governance, workforce development, access, and engagement. Whether the system is a digital health platform, a community referral network, or a social prescribing program, the standard is the same: design equity in, measure it, and prove it.
Food insecurity, housing instability, transportation barriers, and economic insecurity are the upstream determinants of health equity. Referral systems that screen for social needs without tracking whether those needs are met do not close the loop. We advance the standard that SDoH data must travel with the referral — and that outcomes must be documented, not assumed.
Social prescribing — connecting individuals to community-based social services as a health intervention — has transformed community health delivery globally. We have been active in the social prescribing movement for years. We work to advance the evidence base for social prescribing in the U.S. and ensure that social prescribing programs are designed to produce and measure equitable outcomes.
In March 2026, the World Health Organization published its most comprehensive analysis to date of how equity is built into the systems designed to serve underserved communities — 154 studies across regulation, implementation, and evaluation. The central finding: equity is increasingly referenced in strategy, but rarely measured after deployment.
WHO calls this the “cumulative equity gap” — systems that address one layer of a complex problem while leaving the others broken. The report advocates for an equity-by-design approach: equity embedded at every stage of a system’s life cycle, not added as an afterthought.
This failure is not limited to digital health. It appears in social service referral networks, in social prescribing programs, in community health workforce development, and in the procurement and funding processes that reward implementation over evidence.
Equity By Design Inc. was founded to address this failure at the level where it originates: the design standard.
We work at three levels — developing the standard, building the evidence base, and advancing adoption through policy and procurement.
We develop and publish open-access equity-by-design standards and frameworks that organizations can adopt across health and social service sectors — defining what equitable outcomes look like, how to measure them, and what systems must demonstrate to meet the standard.
We conduct and disseminate research on equitable outcomes in digital health, SDoH referral systems, and social prescribing programs — building the evidence base that practitioners, policymakers, and funders need to make better design decisions.
We advocate for equity-by-design requirements in public procurement, federal and state funding programs, and institutional policy — engaging policymakers, funders, and procurement officers to advance the standard through the processes that shape the systems communities depend on.
Equity By Design Inc. is in its founding year and actively building relationships with funders, policymakers, researchers, and community health organizations who share the conviction that equitable outcomes must be designed in — not hoped for.