Umbrella reviews use standardized methods to synthesize evidence across published meta-analyses and systematic reviews. The umbrella reviews we are conducting will assess how Social Determinants of Health (SDOH) have been conceptualized and operationalized in the literature, along with the weight of evidence for each measure. 

The NSF Mid-career award will allow me to lead a small group of research assistants to conduct umbrella reviews on articles that examine Social Determinants of Health (SDOH) and life expectancy. Using an established protocol that organizes SDOH concepts, our team will evaluate review studies to catalog:

 1) How SDOH has been conceptualized

 2) measures used to operationalize SDOH

 3) weight of evidence (WOE) for each measure

 4) the location of publicly available data sources used in these studies. For publicly available data sources, we will standardize SDOH variables to U.S. county boundaries, creating a geographic database of measures identified in our umbrella reviews and their WOE.