During National Men’s Health Week, iTriage and its partner Cutting For A Cure explore health issues affecting African American men. Today, we look at how community outreach efforts are addressing racial and ethnic disparities in health care by spreading awareness and promoting prevention.
As the American health care system undergoes increasing scrutiny by government and public alike, racial and ethnic health disparities have been highlighted as a matter of particular concern, and for good reason. According to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services’ Office of Minority Health, African American men, in comparison to non-Hispanic white men:
- Are 1.3 times as likely to have new cases of lung cancer
- Are 1.4 times as likely to have new cases of prostate cancer
- Have lower 5-year survival rates for lung, colon, and pancreatic cancer
- Are twice as likely to have been diagnosed with diabetes
- Are 60% more likely to have a stroke
The list goes on.
Many cite lack of insurance, poorer quality of care, shortages of healthcare professionals in underserved areas, and a dearth of data on racial and ethnic minority populations as only a few of the many issues that exacerbate an already strained situation.
“Although the health of Americans has generally improved over the past twenty-five years, certain communities are persistently left behind,” says Thomas Fisher, MD, MPH, vice president at Health Care Service Corporation and former leader in the development of the Department of Health and Human Service’s (HSS) Action Plan to Reduce Racial and Ethnic Health Disparities. These health disparities, says Dr. Fisher, are one of the reasons Americans spend more on health care, often with poorer results, than their first-world counterparts.
Dr. Fisher says that Americans need to change the way they think about wellness. “We need to decouple the notions of health and health care,” he says. “Health is constructed at home, at school, and in our communities. Health care is something that happens at our doctors’ offices.”
While health and healthcare are linked, they are different, he says. “We’ve been focusing a lot on health care and the resolution of illness, rather than the maintenance of health, and I think that that paradigm needs to and is changing.”
Steps Forward
This paradigm shift can be seen in the government’s Healthy People 2020, which outlines the HHS’s 10-year objectives for improving the health of Americans. Another big player in the conversation is the HHS’s Action Plan to Reduce Racial and Ethnic Health Disparities, a seminal document that builds upon Healthy People 2020 that Dr. Fisher helped author.
Both government strategies are particularly concerned with social determinants of health, factors that have been proven to greatly affect health outcomes. Access to education and jobs, socioeconomic status, transportation options, racial discrimination, residential segregation, and access to resources such as safe housing and local food markets are just some of many social determinants that influence health disparities. Taking into account the diverse needs and circumstances of all Americans led Dr. Fisher to say, “A rising tide has not lifted all boats. We need to focus efforts to improve the health of all Americans.”
Dennis “Denny Moe” Mitchell at his barbershop
Community events, such as Cutting For A Cure (July 20-22, 2012), which provides free health screenings at Denny Moe’s Superstar Barbershop in Harlem, New York City, during a 48-hour marathon, seek to emphasize the importance of health as well as health care. Cutting for a Cure is the brainchild of barber Dennis “Denny Moe” Mitchell, who felt compelled to take action after being diagnosed in 2010 with Type II diabetes. “Most African-American men don’t like to go to the doctor or even discuss their health,” he explained. “There is a need for raising awareness of health issues that unevenly affect minorities in urban areas, and the neighborhood barbershop is the ideal gathering place to educate the community that disease prevention is the best method of living a healthy life.”
“I think Cutting For A Cure is a perfect example of focusing on health rather than on health care,” said Dr. Fisher. “It’s a great way to concentrate less on the health care setting and more on how we maintain our health and prevent illness where we live, learn, work, and play.”
For more information about iTriage, the free mobile health application, visit www.iTriageHealth.com.
For more information about Cutting For A Cure, visit www.Cutting4aCure.com.
Photo courtesy of University of Chicago
Thomas Fisher, MD, MPH, is Vice-President of Healthcare Management at Health Care Service Corporation. Until September, Dr. Fisher was a 2010-2011 White House Fellow placed at the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services in the Office of the Secretary. As a White House Fellow, Dr. Fisher worked on various Affordable Care Act regulations including those that shape Accountable Care Organization. In this role he also led the development of the Action Plan for Reducing Racial and Ethnic Health Disparities. Dr. Fisher was previously an Assistant Professor at The University of Chicago where he practiced Emergency Medicine and studied racial disparities in health and health care. He has partnered with the New Community Program/Woodlawn in Ask the Doctor, a monthly community discussion on health and participated in founding Project Brotherhood, a health care center specifically for African-American men. He was faculty affiliate of The University of Chicago’s Center for the Study of Race, Politics, and Culture and in 2007 was honored as a Leadership Greater Chicago Fellow and in 2009 as an Aspen Institute Health Forum Fellow. Dr. Fisher holds a Bachelors of Arts from Dartmouth College, a Masters in Public Health from the Harvard School of Public Health, and a Medical Degree from The University of Chicago.