Enhancing quality of care: Screening for social drivers of health in community care settings.

266 Background: Social drivers of health (SDOH) can significantly impact health outcomes, functioning, and quality of life. To identify and address these barriers, the Association of Cancer Care Centers (ACCC) partnered with multidisciplinary cancer care teams, patient advocates, and health equity experts to develop and pilot a screening tool designed to help care teams customize treatment plans and connect patients to support services. Methods: An 18-question screening tool was developed to assess patient concerns related to housing, finances, employment, insurance, transportation, and social and emotional support. The tool was piloted from May to November 2024 across 5 cancer centers—Mosaic Life Care (Missouri), Seidman Cancer Center (Ohio), Tennessee Oncology, Christus Health (Texas), and AnMed Cancer Center (South Carolina). Quality improvement workshops introduced the tool with guidance on data collection and workflow integration. The tool, available in English and Spanish, was completed during patient visits, either independently by patients or with assistance from a provider, depending on site workflow. Results: Implementation across 5 diverse sites demonstrated the tool’s feasibility and impact, with 230 patients reached, and 253 screenings completed. Based on screening results, pilot sites identified and curated community-based resources to address the barriers patients reported. The most frequently identified issues were financial uncertainty, transportation challenges, and food insecurity. The tool provided a standardized approach to capturing patients’ unmet needs, allowing teams to tailor resources to better support the patient. For one patient, SDOH screening showed loss of hospitalization coverage, blocking access to needed inpatient surgery. The care team coordinated support through a financial counselor, social worker, and precertification team, ultimately securing state-funded coverage that enabled the procedure. Conclusions: This pilot demonstrates that a comprehensive SDOH screening tool can be successfully integrated into cancer care. The tool supported patient-centered communication, identified care barriers, and facilitated timely referrals to community-based services. These findings highlight the feasibility and clinical value of embedding SDOH screening into workflows. Future directions include scaling to additional programs, integrating with electronic health records (EHRs), and expanding the Spanish-language version. Overall, results underscore the potential of data-informed strategies to advance equity in cancer care delivery.