Health & Medicine - Posted by Patric Lane-UNC on Wednesday, January 12, 2011 13:30 - 3 Comments 
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(1 votes, average: 4.00 out of 5) Loading ...Mistrust keeps black men from doctor
African American men, especially older ones, delay going to the doctor because of mistrust in the health care system, not because of traditional masculine role norms where they don't want to appear weak. (Credit: iStockphoto)
UNC-CHAPEL HILL (US) — African-American men choose not go to the doctor because they don’t trust the health care system, not because they feel the need to display their masculinity.
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The text of this article by Futurity is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-No Derivatives License.
Overall, men are less likely than women to seek routine, preventive medical care, like blood pressure and cholesterol screenings, according to a new study.
“Men’s concepts of what it means to be a ‘real’ man are generally shaped by traditional masculine role norms, which encourage men to be extremely self-reliant and these norms often affect their health behavior,” says Wizdom Powell Hammond, assistant professor of health behavior and health education at University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill.
“We’ve seen in other studies that men with strong commitment to traditional masculine role norms delay health care because they don’t want to seem weak.
“But this study shows that the opposite may be true for African-American men. Their delays in getting routine check-ups are attributable more to medical mistrust. Their beliefs about masculinity may not always have a negative impact on their use of health care.”
The research is reported in the Journal of General Internal Medicine.
The study was based on surveys of 610 African-American men, aged 20 and older, recruited primarily in barbershops in the North, South, Midwest, and West regions of the U.S. Results were adjusted for possible differences in age, education, income, health insurance, health status, and access to a regular physician.
Men with a stronger commitment to traditional masculine role norms were 23 percent less likely to delay blood pressure screening and 38 percent less likely to delay getting their cholesterol checked than men with a weaker commitment to such norms.
On the other hand, men who reported being highly mistrustful of the medical system were more than twice as likely to delay routine check-ups and cholesterol screenings and three times more likely to delay having their blood pressure checked by a physician or health-care professional than men who were less mistrustful.
“What we found is that mistrust of the medical system accounts for delays in using health care, especially among older African-American men,” Hammond says.
“The survey results indicated that African-American men consider preventive medical services, like getting their blood pressure and cholesterol levels checked, as a demonstration of masculinity, rather than a denial of it.”
Previous studies have shown that, among adults, men are less likely than women to use preventive health services and wait longer after symptom onset before seeking care. This underuse of preventative services coincides with shorter life spans and more preventable deaths among men than women.
Compared to non-Hispanic white men, Hammond says, African-American men go less often for preventive health visits, are less likely to know their cholesterol levels, have poorer blood pressure control and face greater illness and premature death from conditions that usually respond well to treatments if caught in early stages.
“To improve the health of African American men, we should consider addressing why they lack trust in the health-care system and its providers,” Hammond says.
“Health-care providers and public health professionals also might consider leveraging traditional masculine self-reliance in interventions and clinical encounters as a way to empower African American men to ‘seize control’ of their health. This gendered, patient-centered approach could shift power balances, perhaps inspiring greater health-care system trust among African-American men.”
More news from UNC-Chapel Hill: http://uncnews.unc.edu/
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3 Comments
UNCStudent
If you would like to delve deeper into this topic and know more about the root of distrust, which is plausible, then you should read Harriet Washington’s Medical Apartheid
Rhio2k
It’s a mistrust of white in general. You’ll find that a lot of these ways of thinking are passed on from father to sons. My dad (68) doesn’t trust white people and so, avoids going to the doctor, just the way HIS father did. He tells me I trust white people TOO much, and that de-segregating schools was the worst thing to happen to black america, because we didn’t have black teachers to tell us what to look out for, and what not to do, and since we went to school with kids of all races, now we think we’re equal, when the judicial system and job wages show we’re not. I don’t listen to him too much on that angle. I didn’t need an all-black school to tell me that I shouldn’t be listening to self-destructive music (rap), out there on street corners with dreadlocks and my pants around my thighs selling crack and stealing cars like the rest of the knuckleheads out there with criminal records.
It would be interesting to know the reason(s) for this mistrust, especially among different age groups. Also, is there mistrust of white doctors as opposed to African-American doctors? Also evaluated for different age groups. What would be the effect of preventative health screening advertising specifically targeting African-American men? Interesting questions.