Race a factor in health care

Associated Press

WASHINGTON — Minorities in the United States receive lower-quality health care than whites — both for serious conditions and routine services — the Institute of Medicine reported Wednesday.

"Disparities in the health care delivered to racial and ethnic minorities are real and are associated with worse outcomes in many cases, which is unacceptable," said Dr. Alan Nelson, chairman of the committee that prepared the report.

Dr. Lucille Perez, president of the National Medical Association, which represents minority physicians, called the report "timely and powerful."

"It validates what many of us in the NMA have been saying for so long — that racism is a major culprit in the mix of health disparities and has had a devastating impact on African-Americans," she said.

Dr. David Williams of the University of Michigan termed the report "a wake-up call for every health care professional. We have a health care system that is the pride of the world, but this report documents that the playing field is not even."

Nelson said at a briefing on the report that "within the committee itself, we were amazed, some of us surprised and shocked, at the evidence of disparities."

The report, "Unequal Treatment: Confronting Racial and Ethnic Disparities in Health Care," was prepared by the Institute of Medicine, an arm of the National Academy of Sciences, at the request of Congress.

This isn’t the first study to conclude that minority health care in the United States lags.

In January, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported that, while Americans made advances in the 1990s against a broad range of diseases, racial and ethnic disparities remain.

The new report says minorities are less likely than whites to receive appropriate heart medicine, undergo bypass surgery or receive kidney dialysis or transplants. It found differences in receiving cancer treatment and said minorities are less likely to receive the newest treatment for AIDS.