Feature Channels: Race and Ethnicity

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Three separate studies presented today at the American College of Gastroenterology’s (ACG) 77th Annual Scientific meeting in Las Vegas help to advance understanding of the differences between African American and Caucasian patients with Inflammatory Bowel Disease (IBD) and provide clinicians with new insight on how racial disparities involving disease characteristics, infliximab use, and fistulizing Crohn’s disease may impact their patients—and their decisions on how best to manage the disease.

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A University of South Carolina health psychology study shows social marketing and interaction are key to making walking programs work in African-American communities. Findings from Dawn Wilson’s study appear in the latest issue of the American Journal of Public Health. It is the first known study to measure the impact of social marketing in the success of this type of health intervention in impoverished communities.

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Older black patients are three times more likely than older white patients to suffer poorer outcomes after surgery, including death, when cared for by nurses with higher workloads, reports research from the University of Pennsylvania School of Nursing. The large-scale study showed higher nurse workloads negatively affected older surgical patients generally and that the rate was more significant in older black individuals. When the patient-to-nurse ratio increased above 5:1, the odds of patient death increased by 3 percent per additional patient among whites and by 10 percent per additional patient among blacks.

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White non-Hispanic construction workers are awarded higher workers' compensation settlements in Illinois than Hispanic or black construction workers with similar injuries and disabilities, according to researchers at the University of Illinois at Chicago School of Public Health.

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An online study of eligible voters around the country revealed that the preference for whites over blacks is the strongest in the least politically-partisan voters. Among these voters, race biases against Barack Obama could produce as much as a 20 percent gap in the popular vote in a contest that would otherwise be equal.

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Study shows kidney failure and heart disease in diabetic patients may be affected by race.

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Low levels of vitamin D and high levels of parathyroid hormone are associated with increased mortality in African American and Caucasian older adults, according to a new study accepted for publication in The Endocrine Society’s Journal of Clinical Endocrinology and Metabolism (JCEM).

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New study finds African-American youths are over-exposed to alcohol advertising.

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Regular mammography screening can help narrow the breast cancer gap between black and white women, according to a retrospective study published in Breast Cancer Research and Treatment in August.

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Faculty of the Johns Hopkins Berman Institute of Bioethics share personal and professional experiences at the 40th Annual Sickle Cell Disease Association convention in Baltimore, and beyond.

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New research finds that that we can improve our memory of members of another race by identifying ourselves as part of the same group. Such identification could improve everything from race relations to eyewitness identification.

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A spectrum of disparities exist in the surgical management of well-differentiated thyroid cancer, according to new data presented at the 82nd Annual Meeting of the American Thyroid Association (ATA) in Québec City, Québec, Canada.

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Researchers at Moffitt Cancer Center and colleagues have published a study describing the greater difficulty in finding matched, unrelated donors for non-Caucasian patients who are candidates for hematopoietic cell transplantation (HCT).

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Even though African American men in the United States are disproportionately more likely to have uncontrolled high blood pressure (or hypertension) than other racial and ethnic groups, they are less likely to take health-preserving medication.

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A study led by investigators from Vanderbilt-Ingram Cancer Center (VICC), Nashville, Tenn., finds that black men with prostate cancer receive lower quality surgical care than white men. The racial differences persist even when controlling for factors such as the year of surgery, age, comorbidities and insurance status.

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Healthcare providers should take into account differences among racial groups when using hemoglobin A1C levels to diagnose and monitor diabetes, new research from Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center suggests.

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Voters’ racial attitudes, both conscious and unconscious, may be a significant factor in this year’s U.S. presidential election, particularly since whites tend to prefer people of their own race, according to research presented at the 120th Annual Convention of the American Psychological Association.

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• Young black patients and patients without private health insurance are less likely to be assessed for a kidney transplant when they start dialysis. • These patients are also less likely to be put on the transplant waiting list and to receive a kidney transplant. • The findings may help explain the racial and socioeconomic disparities in access to kidney transplantation that are well documented. A kidney transplant is the best treatment for kidney failure, which afflicts 2 million people worldwide.

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A new poll by the University of Delaware’s Center for Political Communication reveals support for voter identification laws is strongest among Americans who harbor negative sentiments toward African Americans.

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Major disparities exist along racial and ethnic lines in the United States for various medical conditions, but guidance is scarce about how to reduce these gaps. Now, a new "roadmap" has been unveiled to give organizations expert guidance on how to improve health equity in their patient populations.

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Exposure to stress can increase the risk for violent behaviors and depressive symptoms for African-American young adults. Different types of stress, particularly racial discrimination, can influence the level of this risk, finds a new study by Lorena Estrada-Martínez, PhD, assistant professor at the Brown School at Washington University in St. Louis.

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Experts have thought that multiracial adolescents, the fastest growing youth group in the United States, use drugs and engage in violence more than their single-race peers. But in a new study, researchers find that mixed-race adolescents are more similar to their white counterparts than previously believed.

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Study shows that the liquid coating the airways is more acidic in newborn pigs with cystic fibrosis than in healthy newborn pigs. The increased acidity reduces the ability of the liquid to kill bacteria. Making the airway liquid less acidic restores bacterial killing in CF airways to almost normal levels.

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A summer writing institute for adolescent black males based at the University of Illinois at Chicago is advancing literacy around the country through two Scholastic, Inc. curricula based on it.

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In "Invisible Men: Mass Incarceration and the Myth of Black Progress," UW sociologist Becky Pettit shows how most surveys overestimate black progress in the United States.

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The American Heart Association, Society for Women’s Health Research (SWHR), and WomenHeart: The National Coalition for Women with Heart Disease, yesterday applauded passage of important legislation that would make crucial data available about how new drugs and medical devices affect women, minorities and ethnic groups.

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The racial and ethnic composition of a community is associated with the obesity risk of individuals living within the community, according to a study led by researchers at the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ) and the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. The findings may help explain disparities in obesity rates among racial groups and point to some of the environmental factors that may contribute to obesity in the U.S.

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A Kansas State University researcher is finding that racial profiling can involve an additional factor: gender. The researcher is analyzing police actions during routine traffic stops to understand how race and gender are connected.

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Racial discrimination could lessen the mental-health benefits usually associated with better socio-economic position for African-American men, finds a new study by Darrell L. Hudson, PhD, assistant professor of public health at the Brown School at Washington University in St. Louis.

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Researchers at Moffitt Cancer Center have found that in African-American families where men are diagnosed with prostate cancer, they have unmet psychosocial needs that affect their survivorship, as well as family and social relationships.

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An Indiana University study found that teens and young adults who are members of multiple minority or disadvantaged groups face more discrimination than their more privileged peers and, as a result, report worse mental and physical health.

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The 2-1-1 phone information and referral system could be a key partner in efforts to reduce cancer disparities affecting low-income and racial and ethnic minorities in the U.S., finds a new study by Jason Purnell, PhD, assistant professor of public health at the Brown School at Washington University in St. Louis.

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Despite increasing numbers of multiethnic neighborhoods in the United States, relatively few black or white families are actually moving into these types of communities, according to a new study in the June issue of the American Sociological Review.

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Sleep-disordered breathing (SDB), commonly known as sleep apnea, is associated with an increased risk of cancer mortality, according to a new study.

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University of Utah students in the American Indian Patient Experience Think Tank course at the University of Utah’s Honors College took an in-depth look at the complex issues surrounding American Indian healthcare.

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The disproportionately high impact of breast cancer on African American women may be related to cultural factors affecting perceived access to screening and other breast health care services, according to a paper in the May issue of Advances in Nursing Science. The journal is published by Lippincott Williams & Wilkins, a part of Wolters Kluwer Health.

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After the 2008 election of President Barack Obama, many proclaimed that the country had entered a post-racial era in which race was no longer an issue. However, a new large-scale study shows that racial attitudes have already played a substantial role in 2012, during the Republican primaries. They may play an even larger role in this year's presidential election.

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New research into "health care deserts" finds that primary-care physicians are especially hard to find in predominantly Black and/or low-income Hispanic metropolitan neighborhoods.

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A new study confirms that though born with equal abilities to tell other-race people apart, by age 9 months infants are better at recognizing faces and emotional expressions of same-race people and the ability to distinguish other-race faces and match emotional sounds with expressions declines.

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To improve the quality of life in gay men and minorities treated for prostate cancer, a greater awareness of ethnic and sexual preference-related factors is needed to help men choose a more-suitable treatment plan, researchers from Thomas Jefferson University Hospital conclude in a literature review published May 1 in Nature Reviews Urology.

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Pervasive racial bias in American medical practice adversely affects treatment and diagnosis for African American patients, according to new research from The University of Texas at Austin.

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The latest National Healthcare Disparities Report shows that access to health care was not improving for most racial and ethnic groups in the years 2002 through 2008 leading up to enactment of the Affordable Care Act.

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Florida State University kicks off its 50th Anniversary of Integration celebration on Thursday with a human chain designed to represent the legacy of the pioneering individuals who paved the way for the rich culture, diversity and opportunity that exist at the university today.

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As part of National Minority Cancer Awareness Week during April 15 to 21, The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center has developed a series of food plate worksheets that focus on nutrition and cancer prevention for African American, Hispanic and Vietnamese audiences.

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Roswell Park Cancer Institute's Song Yao, PhD, Christine Ambrosone, PhD, and colleagues found that African-American women with a specific genetic variation had half the risk of breast cancer compared to women without it.

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African-Americans and Hispanics with major depressive disorder are less likely to get antidepressants than Caucasian patients, and Medicare and Medicaid patients are less likely to get the newest generation of antidepressants.

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A new study by Johns Hopkins researchers shows that obese white women may be less likely than normal-weight counterparts and African-Americans of any weight or gender to seek potentially lifesaving colon cancer screening tests.

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• Disease prevalence similar between Hispanics in Puerto Rico and California. • Researchers suggest that biology of disease drives tumor behavior. • Expression of estrogen receptor associated with better prognosis.

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Teaching students of all ages about the value of diversity and the serious mental health impacts of bias and stereotyping will help end widespread discrimination in the United States, according to a new American Psychological Association task force report.

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President Barack Obama's response to the death of Trayvon Martin represents "a new direction for his often strained approach to racial matters," says Stephanie Li, assistant professor of English at the University of Rochester and author of Signifying Without Specifying: Racial Discourse in the Age of Obama .