In a recent Viewpoint in JAMA, co-authors Ronald Wyatt, MD, of the Joint Commission and David R. Williams, PhD, of the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health discuss the potential contribution of societal racial bias to disparities in health care and health status.
Titled “Racial bias in health care and health: Challenges and opportunities,” the piece asks what can be done to approach these interconnected issues. The authors write, “Successfully addressing the possibility of clinician bias begins with awareness of the pervasiveness of disparities, the ways in which bias can influence clinical decision making and behavior, and a commitment to acquiring the skills to minimize these processes.”
The authors also recommend that “Medical schools, health care organizations and credentialing bodies should pay greater attention to disparities in health and health care as a high national priority. These organizations should redouble their efforts to increase awareness of disparities, enhance diversity in the health professions, and work toward eliminating discrimination and its adverse effects on health and health care.”
“These economic disparities affect where people live, learn, work, play and worship—and all of these factors can in turn impact health,” Williams said in a follow-up interview at Harvard about the JAMA piece.
Williams is the Florence Sprague Norman and Laura Smart Norman Professor of Public Health at the Harvard T. H. Chan School of Public Health and professor of African and African American Studies and of Sociology at Harvard University.
Dr. Wyatt is the medical director in the Division of Healthcare Improvement at the Joint Commission. Dr. Wyatt will be the featured keynote speaker during the AMA Minority Affairs Section Annual Meeting, scheduled for June 2016 in Chicago.
