OBJECTIVES We compared health status, access to care, and utilization of medical services in the United States and Canada and compared disparities according to race, income, and immigrant status. METHODS We analyzed population-based data on 3505 Canadian and 5183 US adults from the Joint Canada/US Survey of Health. Controlling for gender, age, income, race, and immigrant status, we used logis...

OBJECTIVE The objective of our study of oral health disparities in Appalachia was to use existing data sources to geographically analyze suspected disparities in oral health status in the 420 counties of Appalachia, and to make sub-state comparisons within Appalachia and to the rest of the nation. The purpose of this manuscript is to describe the methods used to overcome challenges associated w...

Eliminating the well-documented health disparities found within the United States population is a laudable public policy goal. Social justice demands that we understand the sources of health inequality in order to eliminate them. A central dilemma is: To what extent are health disparities the result of unequal distribution of resources, and thus a consequence of varied socioeconomic status (or ...

OBJECTIVES We examined health care disparities in Korean urban homeless people and individual characteristics associated with the utilization of health care. METHODS We selected a sample of 203 homeless individuals at streets, shelters, and drop-in centers in Seoul and Daejeon by a quota sampling method. We surveyed demographic information, information related to using health care, and health...

The National Center for Cultural Competence (2000) has linked the cultural competence of researchers and practitioners to the elimination of health disparities among various racial/ethnic groups when compared to Anglo groups in the U.S. In addition there are institutional requirements for cultural competence in providing health care and conducting research. Cultural competence may be a needed c...

THE COMMONWEALTH FUND ONE EAST 75TH STREET NEW YORK, NY 10021-2692 TEL 212.606.3800 FAX 212.606.3500 E-MAIL [email protected] http://www.cmwf.org Children are affected by widespread disparities in health status and in the quality of the health care they receive. Given the increasing number of minority children in the U.S., research on these disparities is very important. Paying heed to the inequali...

This article advances the concept of racialized legal status (RLS) as an overlooked dimension of social stratification with implications for racial/ethnic health disparities. We define RLS as a social position based on an ostensibly race-neutral legal classification that disproportionately impacts racial/ethnic minorities. To illustrate the implications of RLS for health and health disparities ...

Although research on health disparities has been prioritized by the National Institutes of Health, the Institute of Medicine, and Healthy People 2010, little has been published that examines the biology underlying health disparities. Allostatic load is a multisystem construct theorized to quantify stress-induced biological risk. Differences in allostatic load may reflect differences in stress e...