New commission targets health care disparities

Its goals include encouraging the training of more minority physicians and increasing cultural competency.

By Susan J. Landers, AMNews staff. Feb. 21, 2005.

Washington -- A major effort to ensure that members of all racial and ethnic groups have equal access to the best health care has to offer was launched Jan. 31 by the AMA, the National Medical Assn. and the National Hispanic Medical Assn.

"We'll use our skills and the science and art of medicine in ways that have not been used before," said AMA President John C. Nelson, MD, MPH, at a press briefing to announce the Commission to End Health Care Disparities. "Our nation's physicians must strive to ensure that all patients can receive the highest quality of health care."

The three physicians' groups have joined with more than 30 other health-related organizations to form the commission, which intends to educate physicians and other health professionals about existing gaps in care and to develop and disseminate strategies to help bridge those gaps.

The health disparities are very real, Dr. Nelson said. For example, while state-of-the-art clot-buster drugs are used 59% of the time among white male heart attack patients, the rate is 44% for African-American females.

The issue is also one of quality of care, and substandard care is costly in terms of dollars as well as lives lost, Dr. Nelson said.

"To close gaps in health care that are based on race and culture, we must honestly and effectively confront and eliminate them at their source," said Randall W. Maxey, MD, PhD, immediate past president of the NMA.

Two projects are already under way, Dr. Maxey said. The commission has sent out surveys to 2,000 physicians to gather information about what works and what doesn't in physicians' interactions with patients from racial or cultural minority groups. "The survey will help us to understand what doctors can do and what they are doing," he said.