Adversity Node | LCT-RN | Center for Healthier Children, Families & Communities

Preventing and overcoming adversity.

Few interventions effectively target the root causes of adversity, including social determinants of health (e.g., income distribution, patterns of incarceration, historically disadvantaged neighborhoods). Efforts to develop, test, and scale approaches that can address social determinants are essential to support low- resource families, build wealth and flourishing, and improve two-generational life course trajectories.

Photograph of a group of children playing, silohuetted by the sunset.

Node Leadership

Elizabeth Barnert, MD MPH

Pediatrician and Associate Professor of Pediatrics, David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA

Adam Schickedanz, MD PhD

Assistant Professor, Department of Pediatrics & Department of Health Policy & Management, UCLA

Node Projects

Medical-Financial Partnership

The LCT-RN Adversity Node is working to expanding an evidence-based family wealth building intervention called the Medical-Financial Partnership, to prenatal and pediatric clinics in two Los Angeles County Department of Healthcare Services sites, with potential for wider spread in partnership with County and State Title V programs. Expectant parents in prenatal care safety-net clinics will receive financial coaching from trained coaches—as well as a range of screening and resources—and will be followed postnatally for 9 months. Matched comparison participants receive their usual prenatal care.

Universal Basic Income + Re-entry Services

In partnership with the Anti-Recidivism Coalition (ARC) in California, Adversity Node members are testing bundling Universal Basic Income with Re-entry Services via a Randomized Controlled Trial for Transition Age Youth after incarceration with a focus on family supports and impacts.

For those enrolled in the Anti-Recidivism Coalition’s Re-entry Services (which include evidence-based programming such as housing, education, workforce development, and credible messenger support), Node members are supplementing participants with $500 monthly for one year and evaluating its impact using a randomized control trial.