PREPARATION AND PRACTICE Addressing the Nation’s Healthcare Disparities: A Call for Commitment
A decade ago, the United States received an important “wake-up call” that put new meaning in Samuel Merritt University’s mission to “positively transform the experience of care in diverse communities.” Unequal Treatment: Confronting Racial and Ethnic Disparities in Health Care, was a landmark 2002 report prepared by the Institute of Medicine (IOM) at the request of Congress. The report’s findings told a story of disturbing differences in the availability, quality, and desirability of medical services that the American healthcare system provides to patients from racial and ethnic minorities. Summarizing the results of more than 100 studies of healthcare quality, Unequal Treatment found that racial and ethnic minority populations consistently tend to receive less care, lower quality care, and less desirable services. Differences in age, income, insurance coverage, treatment setting, and severity of disease did not explain the disparities. Above all, these disparities result in poorer health, greater disability, and earlier death for members of minority communities. Unequal Treatment began a conversation that has reverberated through the healthcare professions and higher education. The Institute of Medicine recommended raising public and practitioner awareness, addressing conditions in healthcare settings, revising regulatory policies, and improving patient and provider education. The W.K. Kellogg Foundation picked up the challenge to examine the issue in greater depth. The Foundation’s
6