The Health Status of Minority Population in the United States - Research Paper Example

?The health status of minority population in the United s is poor compared to the rest of the population. Minorities are deprived of good healthcare facilities. The healthcare advancements of the nation is yet to benefit the disadvantaged and negatively privileged. Minorities do not have proper access to the healthcare facilities. Increasing healthcare costs is also preventing the minorities from seeking medical help. Rural population fails to receive quality healthcare in the United States. The conditions of the minorities in United States are even worse than this. Great health care disparities prevail in United States. Health status of the negatively privileged population is poor. Ethnic and racial minorities suffer great segregation problems in America. The African Americans, Native Americans, Hispanics, and Asian Americans struggle to meet the medical expenses. They are comparatively more vulnerable to chronic diseases than the whites. This ill-privileged group has high mortality rate and negative health outcomes. The heavy racial and ethnic disparities in United States reflect in health care sector also. For example, cancer rate is found to be very high among the African Americans (nearly 25% higher than the whites). Other blacks, especially Hispanics, are highly risky towards diabetes. The black minorities who live in unhealthy environment are also vulnerable to various other problems like AIDS and infant mortality. The healthcare policy of the United States is least favorable for this minority groups. The minority population residing in the rural areas does not have a proper access to healthcare facilities. There is great disparity in the healthcare access of minorities and rest of the population. Minorities are deprived of efficient and good quality healthcare facilities. Rural residents of United States report poor health. They are more vulnerable to chronic conditions like diabetes. Heart disease is also not uncommon among them. Compared to their urban counterparts, minorities living in rural areas are more prone to diseases and are also deprived of good healthcare facilities. Negatively privileged minorities seldom receive the preventive services, and do not get access to good healthcare service providers. Even though they have more healthcare needs compared to others we find that they do not take proper treatment. The statistics of cancer screening and treatment of diabetes and heart diseases show that minorities are not always benefited of the treatment. Minorities residing in rural areas are disadvantaged because of several reasons. Only nine percent of the doctors of the United States practice in the rural areas though rural areas have a heavy population who are in real need of healthcare facilities. Almost 20 percent of the nation’s population lives in rural areas. Rural residents choose not to avail medical facilities for they have to travel long distance to reach quality healthcare service providers. Certain improvements in healthcare for chronic conditions, availability of preventive services and access to quality healthcare have contributed to the reduction of disparity in healthcare field. These day minorities are fortunate to get better access to healthcare facilities. For example, access to pediatric vision care, timing of antibiotics, counseling for addictions, receipt of mammography and various other things have improved for negatively privileged people. However still there are disadvantaged populations who are not benefited out of these improvements. Asians, Indians, Alaska Natives, Hispanics, Latinos and few other populations still suffer from the lack of quality healthcare service. For example, when we look at the colon cancer screening statistics we can find this disparity. The disparity is increasing in spite of other attempts to give more privileges to the negatively privileged population. Disparities have also affected Hispanics and other people of color. Treatments for psychological disorders also give only a second privileged to blacks and other minorities. Health Care Disparities in Rural Areas Selected Findings from the 2004 National Healthcare Disparities Report examines the healthcare disparities in rural areas. Certain initiatives have attempted to track the healthcare disparities prevailing in the US society. Measures are taken for the narrowing of this healthcare gap. Reports of Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ) reveal the degree of disparities suffered by the minorities. National Healthcare Disparities Report looks into the picture of racial and socioeconomic healthcare inequalities found in the United States. Disparities exist in both access and quality of the healthcare. This intervention tracks the degree of elimination of disparities that trouble the negatively privileged population. The report has included the disparities that are present in varieties of population including metropolitan and other non-core based sectors. The report has analyzed the quality of healthcare regarding healthcare issues like heart attack and diabetes. The report has however failed to cover certain population who suffer because of the disparities. The article has failed to present the exclusive information about certain healthcare needs. Psychological healthcare needs and the disparities present there are seldom presented. The interventions and initiatives are short of presenting cultural competence and are less congruent to specific population. The article Health Care for Minority Women: Recent Findings particularly analyze the disparities and segregation particularly suffered by women of color. The article explains the interventions from Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ). The initiative has thoroughly examined the health issues encountered by women and examine the differences in respect to race and ethnicity. Health status of women belonging to different races is different. The initiative has realized the importance of access to healthcare from the point of view of the weaker sex. The initiative therefore examines the insurance availability of women of different races. The report examines the different healthcare needs women face and look into the discriminations that are present in healthcare access and quality. The report has included healthcare costs and the effect of healthcare cost on women’s access to healthcare facilities. The article has given an exclusive presentation of all aspects of female health problems. However, the article could have provided more information regarding the specific healthcare needs and difficulties of African American women and other women of specific race and ethnicities. They face discrimination in all sectors of life. Their experiences in the healthcare fields would have helped us understand the difficulties of women of color. Hispanic Diabetes Disparities Learning Network in Community Health Centers report gives an excellent description of the learning network project that deals with the diabetes disparity in the Hispanic population. The initiative does a great job by reducing the disparities in the access and quality of the healthcare. The initiative has specifically considered the targeted population and at the same time considered the status of other population. Minority Health: Recent Findings Program Brief has given a great report about the initiatives of Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ). The initiative makes comprehensive attempts to improve the access and quality of healthcare of ethnic minorities. The article includes facts from various articles and reports. The report is exclusive in content and quality. Even though the health status of American population in general has improved in the last few decades, not every group are benefited out of this. Healthcare improvements have not reached the minorities living in rural areas. Minorities live in segregated areas where there are few good healthcare facilities. Blacks and negatively privileged people are driven to poor neighborhoods where they seldom get the basic amenities of life. Minority groups lag behind in the matter of access to good healthcare facilities. Quality healthcare facilities are available only in the wealthy neighborhoods. Minorities are also not financially sound enough to afford the healthcare costs. Majority of them are not privileged to have insurance. They therefore cannot afford health check up, medications and other healthcare amenities. Provider biases, health literacy issues, poor provider-patient communication and various other issues negatively affect the healthcare needs of minorities living in rural areas. Certain initiatives have however decreased the degree of disparities. These initiatives have started addressing the difficulties encountered by minorities in healthcare sectors. These initiatives have been found to be giving great results that improve the healthcare status of the negatively privileged minorities. References Larson SL, Fleishman JA. Rural-urban differences in usual source of care and ambulatory service use: analyses of national data using Urban Influence Codes. Med Care 2003 Jul;41(7 Suppl): III65-74. Slifkin RT, Goldsmith LJ, Ricketts TC. Race and place: urban-rural differences in health for racial and ethnic minorities. Chapel Hill, NC: University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill; 2000. Read More