Most health and social systems reference equity. Almost none measure it after deployment. In March 2026, WHO confirmed it. We exist to close that gap.
Equitable outcomes must be designed into systems — not cited in them.
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. It is rarely measured after deployment. We advance the standard that equitable outcomes must be built in from the start — across infrastructure, data governance, workforce, access, and engagement — and proven.
Screening for social needs without tracking whether those needs are met does 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 has transformed community health delivery globally. We work to advance the evidence base in the U.S. and ensure these programs are designed to produce and measure equitable outcomes — not just connections.
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.
We are 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.