Minorities get less care, says report

WINSTON-SALEM, N.C., Jun 08, 2005 (United Press International via COMTEX) -- A Wake Forest University review says African-American and Hispanic patients with diabetes are less likely than white patients to get preventive care.

The minorities get lesser numbers of eye exams, flu shots or cholesterol tests as part of their diabetes prevention care, says the review of recent studies in the latest issue of American Journal of Managed Care.

Three studies also showed significantly lower rates of flu vaccination -- between 8 percent and 29 percent lower -- in black populations compared to white populations, said Julienne Kirk at the university's School of Medicine.

Six studies that compared cholesterol test rates found that minority populations received fewer such tests than white groups, with the differences ranging from 3.4 percent to 19 percent among the studies.

Five of 36 studies reported a lower rate of eye exams among minority patients compared to white patients, Kirk and colleagues found.

Although minority patients may receive less preventive care in some areas, "the majority of the data indicated that the rates of diabetes monitoring are generally low regardless of the population studied," Kirk said.