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.

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2010 - 20112

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Author: search.filters.author.Perez-Escamilla, R.Subject: search.filters.subject.Latinos

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    Health Care Access Among Latinos: Implications for Social and Health Care Reforms
    (2010) Perez-Escamilla, R.
    According to the Institute of Medicine, health care access is defined as “the degree to which people are able to obtain appropriate care from the health care system in a timely manner.” Two key components of health care access are medical insurance and having access to a usual source of health care. Recent national data show that 34% of Latino individuals do not have health insurance and 27% do not have access to a usual source of health care. This article identifies barriers and solutions for improving health care access among Latino individuals.
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    Acculturation, nutrition, and health disparities in Latinos
    (2011) Perez-Escamilla, R.
    BACKGROUND: Latinos have become the largest minority group in the United States and will represent 25% of the US population by 2050. Latinos experience a disproportionate burden of poverty and poor health outcomes. OBJECTIVES: We critically examined the evidence for a link between acculturation and health disparities in Latinos with a focus on type 2 diabetes (T2D) and nutrition-related risk factors and illustrated how acculturation principles can help design a culturally appropriate T2D self-management intervention in Latinos. DESIGN: Evidence presented in this article was drawn from 1) systematic reviews identified through PubMed searches, 2) backward searches that were based on articles cited, 3) experts in the field, and 4) the author's personal files. RESULTS: The preponderance of the evidence supported an association of acculturation with poor dietary quality and obesity. These associations appeared to be modified by several socioeconomic and demographic factors and were not always linear. The association between acculturation and T2D is unclear. CONCLUSIONS: Longitudinal studies and more sophisticated analytic approaches are needed to better understand if and how acculturation affects health-disparity outcomes in Latinos. Tailoring interventions to the acculturation level of individuals is likely to help reduce health disparities in Latinos.