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

End date: 1999Subject: search.filters.subject.Disparities

Search Results

Now showing 1 - 10 of 34
  • No Thumbnail Available
    Item
  • No Thumbnail Available
    Item
    Lung cancer in African Americans. A call for action.
    (1998) Cooley, ME; Jennings-Dozier, K
    Abstract available at publisher's website.
  • No Thumbnail Available
    Item
    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.
  • No Thumbnail Available
    Item
    Class, race, and infant mortality in the United States.
    (1993) Hogue, C J; Hargraves, M A
    Abstract available at publisher's website.
  • No Thumbnail Available
    Item
    Racial and socioeconomic disparities in childhood mortality in Boston.
    (1985) Wise, P H; Kotelchuck, M; Wilson, M L; Mills, M
    We examined racial and income-related patterns of mortality from birth through adolescence in Boston, where residents have high access to tertiary medical care. Childhood mortality was significantly higher among black children (odds ratio, 1.24; P less than 0.05) and low-income children (odds ratio, 1.47; P less than 0.001). Socioeconomic effects varied for different age groups and causes of death. The largest relative disparity occurred in the neonatal and postneonatal periods, and the smallest in adolescence. Of the total racial differential in neonatal mortality (6.88 deaths per 1000 live births), 51.2 per cent occurred in premature infants, 13.4 per cent in term infants who were small for their gestational age, and 25.9 per cent in neonates who were both premature and small for their age. Black neonatal mortality was elevated at all income levels. Beyond the neonatal period, mortality from respiratory disease, fire, and homicide had strong inverse relationships with income, and mortality from injuries to the occupants of motor vehicles was directly related to income. These data suggest that despite access to tertiary medical services, substantial social differentiation in mortality may exist throughout childhood. Equity in childhood survival will probably require policies that emphasize preventive goals.
  • No Thumbnail Available
    Item
    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.
  • No Thumbnail Available
    Item
    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.
  • No Thumbnail Available
    Item
    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.
  • No Thumbnail Available
    Item
    Race, biology, and health care: reassessing a relationship.
    (1990) Byrd, W M
    Recent reports reaffirm huge disparities in the health of blacks compared to other Americans. These disparities persist in part because of the current attempt by health policy makers to frame racially based health differences in non-racial terms. Yet an historical analysis shows that since ancient times, blacks have been the victims of racism in the biomedical sciences; health-system discrimination and deprivation; and later, medical and scientific exploitation. Race- and class-based structuring of the health delivery system has combined with other factors, including physicians' attitudes conditioned by their participation in slavery, and the scientific myth of black biological and intellectual inferiority, to establish a "slave health deficit" that has never been corrected. Until the persistent institutional racism and racial discrimination in health policy, health delivery, and medical educational systems are eradicated, African-Americans will continue to experience poor health outcome.
  • No Thumbnail Available
    Item
    The health status of minority populations in the United States.
    (1991) Nickens, H W
    There is increasing national recognition that while our nation's health care system is the most expensive in the world, the health care status of Americans overall ranks poorly compared with other Western, industrialized nations. In the United States we tend to look at minority-majority variations of health status, as well as the variations of many other indicators by race or ethnicity, because race and ethnicity are particularly important components of our society. In general, health status indicators of minority Americans are worse than those of whites. In some locales, death rates of minority Americans are comparable to those of Third World nations. At the same time, minority Americans make up a rapidly increasing proportion of the nation's population and work force. Our baseline national data on some minority groups, however, currently are inadequate to detect shifts in health status. Finally, the rapidly expanding problem of the acquired immunodeficiency syndrome among some minority populations provides both an imperative and an opportunity to learn how model prevention programs should be designed and executed.