Area-based interventions to ameliorate deprived Dutch neighborhoods in practice: does the Dutch District Approach address the social determinants of health to such an extent that future health impacts may be expected?

Objective: We studied the local manifestation of a national procedural program that addressed problems regarding employment, education, housing and the physical neighborhood environment, social cohesion, and safety in the most deprived neighborhoods in the Netherlands. We aimed to assess if such a program, without the explicit aim to improve health, results in area-based interventions that address the social determinants of health to such an extent that future health impacts may be expected.

Methods: We used standardized questionnaires and face-to-face interviews with 39 local district managers.