Minority Health and Health Equity Archive

Permanent URI for this collectionhttp://hdl.handle.net/1903/21769

Welcome to the Minority Health and Health Equity Archive (MHHEA), an electronic archive for digital resource materials in the fields of minority health and health disparities research and policy. It is offered as a no-charge resource to the public, academic scholars and health science researchers interested in the elimination of racial and ethnic health disparities.

Browse

Search Results

Now showing 1 - 1 of 1
  • Thumbnail Image
    Item
    Environmental contributions to disparities in pregnancy outcomes.
    (2009) Miranda, Marie Lynn; Maxson, Pamela; Edwards, Sharon
    One of the most persistent disparities in American health status is the pronounced difference in birth outcomes between non-Hispanic black and non-Hispanic white women. Poor pregnancy outcomes have a substantial impact on mortality, morbidity, and health care costs. Increasing evidence indicates that environmental exposures are associated with poor birth outcomes. This paper reviews the latest research on how environmental exposures affect pregnancy outcomes and then discusses how these exposures may be embedded within a context of significant social and host factor stress. The analysis suggests that environmental, social, and host factors are cumulatively stressing non-Hispanic black women and that this cumulative stress may be a cause of the persistent disparities in pregnancy outcomes.