“Of all forms of inequity, injustice in healthcare is the most shocking and inhumane,” these are the words of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. The Civil Rights movement played a significant role in eradicating a more obvious racial barrier in the US healthcare systems. However, the country is still besieged with how best it can address these inequalities that infringes our most fundamental national and professional principles. According to these blogs, the medical field is confronted by a serious medical racism problem that continued to negatively influence modern medicine in the US. According to the blog, THINKPROGRESS a report from the Institute of Medicine, the black Americans received less effective care than the whites in almost all the diseases that were researched. ThoughtCo. Blog, on the other hand, cites poor communication, lack of diversity training and fewer treatment options as the major reasons why racism is still a problem in the US today. Racially biased treatment is a critical abuse of the medical ethics as well as a direct threat to the dignity of the medical profession.
According to THE CONVERSATION blog, the American medical literature has carried and published out numerous peer-reviewed studies which have unknotted racially-inspired decisions by medical professionals that have done more severe medical harm. Nevertheless, the main outcomes from these research studies have been more research of the same kind. For instance, a racial health disparity report of the US from 2003 has raised awareness of this medical problem, yet there has been no discernable influence on the education of medical students or continuing education for physicians (Williams and Rucker, 2000).
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Perception is one main reason why racism in healthcare still exists. Perception of racism emanates from personal past expectations and experiences of disparity in treatment (Williams and Rucker, 2000). For instance, individuals will attend appointments with a view that they will definitely be treated differently due to their race. This, therefore, heightens their individual medical mistrust. According to Hammond (2010), the African Americans were found to have the highest correlation of medical mistrust. This medical mistrust more especially is linked to the Tuskegee Syphilis whereby the medical professionals treated the African American indifferently, thus they still feel that they do not know who to really trust.
Also, the preconceived expectations and beliefs of a patient based on their socioeconomic status, education level and race perpetuate these issues (Williams and Rucker, 2000). It is from these partial beliefs that lend patients to unequal treatment as well as lending the physicians the unwillingness to aggressively treat all patients equally.
Solution
Increase Infrastructure
To dismantle racism in the medical field, it is essential to make a thorough change of systems. The process of change should mainly focus on changing the organizational culture and its policies that have effects on the organization as a whole, the staff and the environment (Hammond 2010). The process of change should ensure that the entire organization system and culture changes and not just individuals or the problematic change of policies.
Monitoring
Monitoring of and addressing policies, organizational values and norms, resource allocations, individual skills and attitudes and relational structures and racism will play a great role in dismantling racial medical disparity. These are elements that provide data that is critical to the process that provides strategies for understanding where and how to intervene at various levels in dismantling racial disparity in healthcare systems.
Increasing Economic Infrastructure of Disadvantaged Communities
By increasing the economic status of disadvantaged communities will help narrow the socioeconomic gap that is experienced between the African Americans and the Whites. Also improving the quality of healthcare as well as a rethinking of healthcare policies in various regions and states can help eradicate racism in healthcare. Williams and Jackson (2005), contend that to effectively dismantle racial disparity in the medical field, it requires addressing the distal social strategies and plans that create the discrimination in the first place.
Increasing the Number Of Physicians Of Color
There is a high demand for physicians of color in regions with significant minority populations. Increasing the number of physicians of color could help diminish the perceived racism that is felt and experienced by patients thus heightening the satisfaction and treatment of these patients. For instance, in 2003 4% of the US physicians were African American and as mentioned above most patients prefer being treated by doctors of the same color (Williams and Jackson 2005). As such, an affirmative action is the best-proposed solution.
Political Commitment
Political commitment towards offsetting racial discrimination in healthcare by the US Government can guarantee equitable access to medical care to all Americans regardless of their skin color (Williams and Jackson 2005). By ensuring that all the citizens regardless of their socioeconomic status or race receive equal health care services, the well-being of individuals would increase. This will translate to increase in social and economic status thus receiving respect from others. In fact, physicians would also be motivated to treat patients with more dignity and respect.
Conclusion
Although racial disparity has been around for many years and appear to find ways to obstruct the lives of those affect, health care is one thing that everyone ought to be entitled to and a necessity in order to lead a healthy life. Racism in medical field more especially against the African Americans has existed either directly or indirectly based on a perceived racism by patients from lower socioeconomic status. Racism in healthcare will be a thing of the past when health care becomes affordable for all and not influenced by one's socioeconomic status. Otherwise, the lower income earners and minority groups will continue to experience a lower quality of healthcare services and racial discrimination.
References
Hammond, W. P. (2010). Psychosocial correlates of medical mistrust among African American men. American Journal of Community Psychology, 45(1-2), 87-106. doi: 10.1007/s10464-009-9280-6
Williams, D. R., & Jackson, P. B. (2005). Social sources of racial disparities in health. Health Affairs, 24(2), 325-334.
Williams, D. R., & Rucker, T. D. (2000). Understanding and addressing racial disparities in health care. Health Care Financing Review, 21(4), 75-88.
