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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Start date: 1990End date: 1999

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Now showing 1 - 10 of 98
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    Use of Native American Healers Among Native American Patients in an Urban Native American Health Center
    (1998) Marbella, Anne M.; Harris, Mickey C.; Diehr, Sabina; Ignace, Gerald; Ignace, Georgianna
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    Social Conditions as Fundamental Causes of Disease
    (1995) Link, Bruce G.; Phelan, Jo
    Over the last several decades, epidemiological studies have been enormously successful in identifying risk factors for major diseases. However, most of this research has focused attention on risk factors that are relatively proximal causes of disease such as diet, cholesterol level, exercise and the like. We question the emphasis on such individually-based risk factors and argue that greater attention must be paid to basic social conditions if health reform is to have its maximum effect in the time ahead. There are two reasons for this claim. First we argue that individually-based risk factors must be contextualized, by examining what puts people at risk of risks, if we are to craft effective interventions and improve the nation's health. Second, we argue that social factors such as socioeconomic status and social support are likely 'fundamental causes" of disease that, because they embody access to important resources, affect multiple disease outcomes throughmultiple mechanisms, and consequently maintain an association with disease even when intervening mechanisms change. Without careful attention to these possibilities, we run the risk of imposing individually-based intervention strategies that are ineffective and of missing opportunities to adopt broad-based societal interventions that could produce substantial health benefits for our citizens
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    Lung cancer in African Americans. A call for action.
    (1998) Cooley, ME; Jennings-Dozier, K
    Abstract available at publisher's website.
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    Ethnicity and cancer outcomes: Behavioral and psychosocial considerations.
    (1998) Meyerowitz, Beth E.; Richardson, Jean; Hudson, Sharon; Leedham, Beth
    Abstract available at publisher's website.
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    Racial disparities in reported prenatal care advice from health care providers.
    (1994) Kogan, M D; Kotelchuck, M; Alexander, G R; Johnson, W E
    Abstract available at publisher's website.
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    Class, race, and infant mortality in the United States.
    (1993) Hogue, C J; Hargraves, M A
    Abstract available at publisher's website.
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    Infant mortality in the United States: trends, differentials, and projections, 1950 through 2010.
    (1995) Singh, G K; Yu, S M
    Abstract available at publisher's website.
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    The public's health, its national identity, and the continuing dilemma of minority status.
    (1999) Murray-García, J
    Racial and ethnic disparities in health status are persistent phenomena well described in the arena of public health. Such disparities are perhaps best understood in their full social, political, and historical context. While recognizing the rich literature on social determinants of health, this paper provides a specific discussion of the status of "the minority" in the United States. The dynamic nature of the American identity is first presented, along with implications for differential health status. Next discussed are emerging paradigms in research and intervention that incorporate the dynamic nature of the American identity as both an explanation and an opportunity for remedy of health status disparities. Finally, a critical leadership role for the public health profession is proposed as urgently needed and as yet incompletely embraced.
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    The three leading causes of death in African Americans: barriers to reducing excess disparity and to improving health behaviors.
    (1999) Feldman, R H; Fulwood, R
    African Americans suffer disproportionately from several major health problems associated with high morbidity and mortality. The 1985 DHHS Secretary's Task Force Report on Blacks and Other Minorities identified six major disease categories of excess deaths for African Americans compared with whites by applying the lower death rate for whites to the American population. The report provided a stimulus for public and private action to begin to address the health disparities between minority and nonminority populations. This article examines three of the leading causes of death for African Americans and assesses the extent to which the health disparity between African Americans and whites has been reduced. The three leading causes of death for African American males are diseases of the heart, cancer, and HIV infection/AIDS. The conditions are the same for African American females except stroke replaces HIV infection. Three health outcomes measures are discussed: life expectancy, excess death rates, and years of potential life lost. A widening of the gap between the races was found for diseases of the heart and HIV infection for males and for cancer for females. An extensive list of barriers to reducing the disparity are presented from the scientific literature and strategies for reducing the three health problems are recommended.