Racism In Modern Medicine

Racism in Modern Medicine   Black patients seemed to seek out black doctors, seeing them 22 percent of the time, while whites saw black doctors less than 1 percent of the time. Nationwide, 5 percent of physicians are black”. “African-American patients will tend to believe that race does play a role in the doctor-patient relationship and that they will express patient mistrust and dissatisfaction with their personal physicians”. “Nearly 28 percent of physicians primarily treating blacks said they could not provide access to high-quality care for all their patients, compared with only 19 percent of doctors primarily treating whites”. “A recent study in The New England Journal of Medicine showed that blacks not only waited longer than whites for kidney transplants, but that they waited longer to get on a kidney transplant waiting list, even though they disproportionately suffered from kidney failure”.   “Compared with whites, black women are twice as likely to receive inappropriate treatment for ovarian cancer, and they have a worse prognosis; blacks with lung cancer are less likely to receive possibly curative surgery; and blacks with heart disease get fewer cardiac angiograms and bypass operations, have worse outcomes after a heart attack and are less likely to receive standard drugs like aspirin and beta blockers”.   “In one study, minority nursing home patients were less likely than white patients to receive medicine for their pain”.   “In terms of differences of access or treatment racial minorities are less likely than whites to receive certain cardiac diagnostic procedures”.   “Compared to whites a higher percentage of Black and Native American babies die in the first year of life”.   Good communication between doctors and patients seemed to protect against perceptions of racial discrimination.” Quality physician-patient communication was associated with a 71 % decrease in the odds of reporting racial and ethnic bias during healthcare visits.” Healthcare providers...