Whites, blacks split on health care assessments
Whites and members of minority groups in Arkansas hold starkly different views of discrimination in health care and health equity issues, a survey formally released Friday found.
The Arkansas Racial and Ethnic Health Disparity Study, conducted by the Arkansas Minority Health Commission through the University of Arkansas at Little Rock Survey Research Center, polled 2,330 state residents by telephone on perceptions of health care, access to providers and racial issues.
Among respondents from both rural and urban areas, whites were far more likely to say that black and Hispanic Arkansans are treated fairly in the health care arena, while close to half of black respondents said they were treated less fairly.
Black and Hispanic Arkansans were more than twice as likely as whites to say they had experienced discrimination in a health care setting. Among racial groups, whites were also the most likely to say they were “very satisfied” with the quality of health care they receive.
The survey was last conducted in this format in 2009 and produced similar results this year, showing “we haven’t made a lot of progress” on health equity, Arkansas Minority Health Commission Director ShaRhonda Love said.
The commission works on
initiatives that support the health of minority groups in the state, especially projects that expand preventative care.
Love presented the group’s survey findings Friday at a luncheon at the Clinton Presidential Center in Little Rock, which was attended by commissioners, elected officials, agency staff, public health professionals and community members.
She called the survey “an important tool” in understanding beliefs about well-documented health disparities affecting minority groups, such as barriers to accessing care and a higher disease burden.
“Minority health impacts the health of our state and our nation,” she said. “Therefore, it is the work of everyone [to address it].”
The 62-question survey, the full results of which can be downloaded at arminorityhealth.com, questioned respondents extensively about their attitudes pertaining to health care.
It found that white and Hispanic Arkansans were much more likely to say they had a “great deal” of trust in doctors.
White survey respondents also were more likely to attribute a higher prevalence of health problems among minorities to “genetics and family history,” as opposed to “diet and nutrition,” the explanation favored by black Arkansans.
A theme also arose, the survey said, around treatment in doctor’s offices regarding insurance status.
“The general consensus from respondents was that ‘people with better health insurance were treated with more respect’ and [were] ‘treated differently,’” the report notes.
The survey highlighted issues related to access to care among Hispanic people, who were the most likely to say they would seek treatment at a public clinic. Close to half of Hispanic people surveyed said they needed an interpreter to help them talk to a doctor, despite the fact they could “somewhat” or “fully” understand the physician.
Regardless of race, a majority of respondents said they have had their cholesterol checked and have discussed exercise and the importance of quitting smoking with their doctor.
State Sen. Joyce Elliott moderated a panel of public health and health policy experts who spoke in broad terms about health equity.
Sterling Moore, University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences vice chancellor for regional campuses, said he was one of the first black clinic managers in that system, and stressed the importance of employing workers from different backgrounds and in varying roles.
“We didn’t have any black nurses, and the predominant group that we were serving in El Dorado was black,” he said.
To spur that hiring, he urged the expansion of pipeline programs for young people and creative recruiting, outside of typically high-achieving students.
Asked about the most urgent health challenges affecting minority groups in the state, panelists discussed maternal and infant mortality affecting black patients.
Craig Wilson, health policy director for Arkansas Center for Health Improvement, and Tionna Jenkins, health equity senior adviser and Arkansas regional director of the Clinton Foundation, said those mortality rates were three times as high for black women and two times as high for black babies as the general population, even among families with high income and education levels.
The survey also covered beliefs on race relations, with black Arkansans living in urban areas having the lowest percentage of people who viewed race relations as “very good.”
White respondents were much more likely to say they “never” thought about race, while 45 percent of black respondents in urban areas, 44 percent from rural areas and 34 percent of Hispanic respondents said they thought about race “constantly.”
Love said Arkansas Minority Health Commission’s recommendations from the results included working to increase awareness of racial and health disparities; improving providers’ “cultural competence,” or understanding of different cultural backgrounds; and improving diversity in the health care workforce.
That’s important, she said, so people can communicate in plain language with their doctors and feel understood.