Nationwide project shows that your neighborhood impacts your life expectancy

A nationwide project demonstrates that what neighborhood you live in has an impact on your life expectancy. The United States Small-Area Life Expectancy Project (USALEEP) is a public health project measuring life expectancy at birth for nearly every neighborhood in the country. USALEEP data provide community health insights and show that not everyone has the same opportunity to be healthy where they live.

The project is a joint effort from The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, National Association for Public Health Statistics and Information Systems, and the National Center for Health Statistics at the Centers for Disease Control. The project shows that a distance as short as 10 miles can mean a life expectancy difference of nearly 33 years. Though the average life expectancy for the entire U.S. is 78.8 years, across the U.S., life expectancies can differ by 41.2 years. Life expectancy data used in the project came from census tract and death records.

The USALEEP website lists access to healthy food, good schools, affordable housing, and jobs that provide the resources needed to care for families as crucial conditions that are needed in neighborhoods to improve health and longevity and prevent people from getting sick. These conditions are generally known as the social determinants of health (SDoH). Case managers are frequently faced with how mitigate the effects of SDoH on their patients in order to prevent readmissions and to transition them to long-term care.