Disparity refers to the differences in treatments. In societies that are as diverse as the U.S, disparities within the population range from cover by medical plans, economic strength, social acumen and racial aggrandizement (Braveman, 2011). For instance, most health policies such as Medicaid or Obama care remain inaccessible to undocumented immigrants despite the fact that they contribute substantially to the U.S economic progress. Most immigrants live in fear, and that has hindered most of them from accessing health services from the agencies. One of the significant causes of worry among immigrants is the economic level. Following their financial status, they fear to go to the doctors since they are not capable of settling the bills. Most of them consider visiting the doctor in the last minute when things are already out of hands (Page-Reeves et al. 2013).
Another cause of fear is language, immigration status as well as discrimination. Those immigrants with illegal documents regarding their stay in the country fear to go for medical help since they believe the health providers may interrogate them or reveal their identity. Inability to communicate with the doctors also makes most immigrants not to go hospitals (Braveman, 2011). The significance of all these is discrimination against people of color in the states even discourages most of them from seeking health assistance (Page-Reeves et al. 2013). Structural violence indeed causes health disparity hence increased mortality rate among the minority groups.
Cultural diversity brings many challenges to the nursing fraternity as both patients and nurse fails to understand each other on significant health issues. While conducting a health education, patients and nurses need to understand one another culturally to reach an agreement (Cioffi, 2006). People from various regions have unique cultures regarding health and only need the right speaker to teach them on sensitive health issues. Cultural diversity usually causes misunderstandings between the patients and the nurses and that may make some people fail to seek medical help from health clinics (Cioffi, 2006). Nurses, therefore, need to increased sensitivity and awareness of cultural nuances and issues and handle them with seriousness (Lowenstein and Glanville, 1994). They can achieve this by employing nurses that practice different cultures who can learn from one another hence handle patients from various cultures the right way.
References
Braveman, P. A., Kumanyika, S., Fielding, J., LaVeist, T., Borrell, L. N., Manderscheid, R., & Troutman, A. (2011). Health disparities and health equity: the issue is justice. American journal of public health, 101(S1), S149-S155.
Cioffi, J. (2006). Culturally diverse patient-nurse interactions on acute care wards. International Journal of Nursing Practice, 12(6), 319-325.
Lowenstein, A. J., & Glanville, C. (1994). Cultural diversity and conflict in the healthcare workplace. Nursing economic$, 13(4), 203-9.
Page-Reeves, J., Niforatos, J., Mishra, S., Regino, L., Gingrich, A., & Bulten, R. (2013). Health disparity and structural violence: How fear undermines health among immigrants at risk for diabetes. Journal of health disparities research and practice, 6(2), 30.
Links
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/7630441https://digitalscholarship.unlv.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1175&context=jhdrp
http://ajph.aphapublications.org/doi/abs/10.2105/AJPH.2010.300062
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/17176304
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