CRWL 's Center for Reducing Health Disparities

Case Western's Center for Reducing Health Disparities is a site that is worth looking into.

Hear are just of few issues that they cover, which includes links to their source material.

• Breast Reconstruction Varies By Race
  Receipt of breast reconstruction varied significantly by patient race/ethnicity (40.9% of whites, 33.5% of African Americans, 41.2% of highly acculturated Latinas, and only 13.5% of less acculturated Latinas; P < .0001). Nearly 14% of less acculturated Latinas said they did not know how to get breast reconstruction, compared with less than 2% for all other groups (P<.001). The differences in survival by race actually appeared to have more to do with the hospitals than the patients themselves. Potential racial differences in access to care or preferences have been used to explain disparities in treatments and patient outcomes. But these are not likely to influence treatment in cardiac arrests since patients were already in the hospital and care of these patients is pretty clear" states Chan.
• Black Patients Experience Worse In-hospital Cardiac Care, Lower Chances Of Survival Medical News Today highlights a new study published in the September 16th issue of the Journal of the American Medical Association. This study points to significant disparities in the rates of successful resuscitation for black patients, making them less likely to survive an in-hospital cardiac arrest compared to white patients.
• Race is a factor in the severity of lupus
  Recognizing the early symptoms of lupus and referring to specialists can reduce setbacks in adequate treatment options. Graciela Alarcón, M.D., a professor of epidemiology at the University of Alabama at Birmingham explains. Rheumatologists are aware of the differences in severity and outcome of lupus among patients of different racial groups," said Graciela Alarcón, M.D., a professor of epidemiology at the University of Alabama at Birmingham. However, she said that these differences are not common knowledge among "general practitioners who are the ones more likely to encounter patients at disease onset when disease manifestations may not be so obvious.

I want to see how Health Care reform will affect these disparities. Whether we are rich or poor, black or white, we should all have the same high level of health care.

It's a rainy, rainy day!

Step 1: find comfortable position setting for the chair: done
Step 2: find computer desk that is right height: seeking, seeking, seeking...

In the meantime,

Still sending those cards and letters to congresscritters in favor of a strong public option, with no triggers.

What have you been doing?

Health care reform or smoke and mirrors?

This is going to be short since I have to get to PT.

I received an email from Healthcare-Now! this morning. I have bolded the bits that I think are important.

We need your help getting a single-payer supporter into Senate Finance Committee roundtable discussions on healthcare reform. The Finance Committee (Led by Sen. Max Baucus - MT) is holding three roundtable discussions on healthcare reform in the coming weeks.

The first discussion, titled “Reforming America’s Health Care Delivery System,” on April 21st, had thirteen witnesses. Aetna was there. Blue Cross Blue Shield was there. But not one single-payer supporter was invited.

This is unacceptable. We need to make sure our representatives respond to the demands of the people. Together, let’s put the Senate Finance Committee to the test and demand they include single-payer experts at the upcoming Roundtable discussions on health reform.

The next two discussions are on May 5th(”Increasing access to health care coverage”) and May 14th (”Financing comprehensive health care reform”.

Here is the link for Healthcare-NOW! that includes more information. If your congressperson is on this committee, please write them and let them know you support Single-Payer healthcare for the American people. Americans deserve no less.