Introduction
Assessing health equity across the whole population has become a necessity as it has the potential to help eliminate or reduce health disparities. The article highlights how a new and improved analytical approach can be used to integrate health equity into healthcare quality assurance using a sample from the United Kingdom. This research paper will analyze whether the approach can be applied in the United States, discuss five current inequities, and how they can be solved.
Using the Analytical Approach in the United States
The United States monitors health disparities using surveillance programs such as Healthy People. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) conducts the majority of health surveillance activities in the United States (Abu-Saad et al., 2018). The Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ) also monitors health disparities across all populations in America (Abu-Saad et al., 2018). The method outlined in the article first linked a key quality indicator (potentially avoidable emergency admissions) with neighborhood indices. The results were compared with the national inequality and inequality within ten similar populations.
Both the CDC and AHRQ are mandated to collect health data that is of high quality and, which can be used to develop national estimates. The model indicated in the research paper can be applied in the United States with the use of data from the two institutes. In the limitation section there is an indication that the method may not be applicable in the United States as the healthcare systems in the country are fragmented (Cookson et al., 2018). This means that there is no accountable care organization that provides similar universal health coverage as the National Health Service (NHS). The lack of a central organization that provides universal health coverage affects the collection of data that can shed light on the health disparities across all populations. However, the United States can adopt the model by ensuring that both the CDC and AHRQ collect health data across all populations that can be used to monitor health equity.
Inequities in the United States Health Care Market
The first inequity in the United States healthcare market is the lack of access to care. People from certain races and ethnic groups are denied access to health care (Lopez et al., 2021). The inequity also manifests itself when individuals from low-income areas and those living in marginalized locations face significant barriers to healthcare access (Lopez et al., 2021). Another inequality is the high rates of uninsured or underinsured people in communities of color. Research indicates that the Affordable Care Act (ACA) helped reduce the disparities, especially among people of color (Lopez et al., 2021). However, the number of uninsured black Americans is still high as the act does not provide for expanded coverage for individuals in marginalized communities.
The next inequity in the United States is disparities concerning mental health illnesses. The research shows that women in the United States are more prone to developing mental health illnesses than men (Summers-Gabr, 2020). People in the LGBTQ community and individuals in the juvenile system are affected significantly by mental illnesses (Lopez et al., 2021). Another inequity is the burden of disease, which is manifested in the disparities in disease effects that exist between different races and ethnicity. Populations such as Hispanics are more likely to develop asthma than other groups in the United States (Lopez et al., 2021). Data from the CDC shows that there exist significant inequities in the way certain diseases are prevalent in certain populations (Summers-Gabr, 2020). The result is that individuals from these communities experience high mortality rates. The last inequity is death rates among different communities in the United States. There is an indication that white Americans have a higher life expectancy than black Americans (Lopez et al., 2021). This can be blamed on the existing social and economic discrepancies between the two groups.
How to Solve the Inequities
One of the solutions that can help solve health disparities in the United States healthcare market is to advance health equity. The analysis above has shown that the major cause of inequities such as the burden of disease, mortality rates, and lack of access to care is social, racial, and economic disparities. Health equity can be enhanced by expanding health coverage to all individuals who have limited healthcare access (Abu-Saad et al., 2018). Another potential solution is educating marginalized communities on health matters. This can help solve the inequity of mental illnesses and mortality rates. The other significant way to address the disparities is to provide more resources to healthcare organizations. Areas where low-income people live mostly have less health infrastructure, which further expands inequalities (Lopez et al., 2021). By ensuring that these areas are well funded, the government can enhance health equity.
Conclusion
In summary, health equity has become an essential part of planning in the healthcare sector. Understanding the communities that are most affected by healthcare issues can result in the creation of ways that can mitigate diseases and other health aspects. The new analytical approach can be used in the United States as the CDC and AHRQ are effective in collecting high-quality health data from all populations. Education, funding, and enhancing health equity are the potential solutions to reduce health disparities in the United States healthcare market.
References
Abu-Saad, K., Avni, S., & Kalter-Leibovici, O. (2018). Health disparities monitoring in the US: lessons for monitoring efforts in Israel and other countries. Israel Journal of Health Policy Research, 7, 1-14.
Cookson, R., Asaria, M., Ali, S., Shaw, R., Doran, T., & Goldblatt, P. (2018). Health equity monitoring for healthcare quality assurance. Social Science & Medicine, 198, 148-156. Web.
Lopez, L., Hart, L. H., & Katz, M. H. (2021). Racial and ethnic health disparities related to COVID-19. Jama, 325(8), 719-720.
Summers-Gabr, N. M. (2020). Rural-urban mental health disparities in the United States during COVID-19. Psychological trauma: theory, research, practice and policy, 12(S1), S222-S224.