Every day doctors in America provide treatment to some of our sickest patients who live in or unsafe housing. These patients often lack access to basic needs like transportation, nutritious food, heat, a steady income, and social support. Medicine and medical interventions alone will never resolve the complexity of issues that these patients face. The social determinants of health are the circumstances in which people are born, grow up, live, work, and age, and the systems put in place to deal with illness. These circumstances are in turn shaped by a wider set of forces: economics, social policies, and politics.”