[ad_1]
According to a survey funded by the California Health Care Foundation of over 3,000 Black Californiansquestioned, 41% of such individuals conveyed they were educated to their healthcare providers, 35% modified their behavior and speech to put doctors at ease, and 32% paid close attention to their dress before seeing their physician. In other words, a large proportion of Black patients in this survey felt they needed to change their appearance, words, or actions in some way in order to get the best possible care from their physicians. This same survey also revealed that more than a quarter of Black Californians actually avoided medical care because they believed they would be treated unfairly.
This, unfortunately, is the reality of the healthcare system we are a part of here in America. This data should beg the question of why it is that a nation with some of the most accomplished, educated physicians could partake in a system that is outright discriminating against Black Americans? What are practicing physicians in America doing that are alienating Black Americans from seeking care, and in some cases, changing behavior just so that they can get the care that they deserve? Furthermore, although the survey only examined responses from Black Americans, are similar findings and feelings present among other historically disadvantaged groups in America?
According to a cross-sectional study in the Journal of Muslim Mental Health, nearly 1/3 of Muslim Americans surveyed perceived they were discriminated against in the healthcare setting. The most common form of discrimination reported was being excluded or ignored, followed by the use of Muslim clothing such as the hijab, as well as insensitive verbal remarks from healthcare providers. Both of the aforementioned surveys underscore the importance of examining the patient-physician relationship and how to optimize it in order to decrease health disparities amongst marginalized patients in an attempt to provide the most effective care possible.
Medicine, surgery, and healthcare should be much more that just making diagnoses, providing pharmacologic therapies, or establishing life-saving interventions. A physician is not only a diagnostician and healer, but also a listener and advocate for the patient. The patient-doctor relationship is a dynamic one that involves mutual understanding, communication, and empathy. The antithesis of this ideal patient-doctor relationship would be one of discrimination and feelings of ostracization, as is unfortunately occurring in a large proportion of our Black and Muslim patients.
In an effort to ameliorate such disparities, more research is needed to exactly understand and quantify what extent of the American population is experiencing feelings of discrimination in the healthcare arena. This data can then inform reforms that will be needed in the way physicians interact with patients. In addition, adequate representation of physicians across race, ethnicity, gender, and religion is necessary in order to bolster the patient-physician relationship as one that embodies compassion, empathy, and integrity. Currently, there is data to suggest that there is room for improvement as a 2021 UCLA study found that Black physicians make up only 5.4% of the American healthcare workforce, an increase of only 4 percentage points in the last 120 years. Finally, cultural competency training in the form of seminars and simulation geared towards improving communication and understanding of the population that providers serve can decrease healthcare disparities and augment the patient-doctor relationship.
Every doctor in this country, when being given the privilege to practice medicine, swears upon the Hippocratic Oath to faithfully serve patients and do no harm to them. What meaning does this oath have when marginalized patients refuse to step foot in a physician’s office for fear of being judged? We must do better.
[ad_2]
Source link
