Health News: Health Disparities, Uterine Fibroids, Over Diagnosis of Schizophrenia
January 7, 2010 by blackgirlgrown
Filed under health and wellness
Health Reform Gaps for Ethnic Elders: The populations of ethnic elders are growing at two to three times the rate of older non-Hispanic whites. The proportion of ethnic elders in the U.S. will double by 2050 to make up 40 percent of all people aged 65 and over. Multicultural and language issues range from better medical and pain management for African American elders to improving nutrition and exercise among low-income Mexican Americans. Without more serious attention to multicultural seniors, ethnic older Americans and the families will increasingly endure a growing burden of disease and disability, while the U.S. will face billions in unnecessary health costs and billions more in lost productivity gains.
New Minimally Invasive Procedure Shrinks Uterine Fibroids: The Radio Frequency Ablation procedure shrinks uterine fibroids in women 30 years and older. The minimally invasive procedure, initially used to treat liver cancer, uses a tiny needle that is inserted into the fibroid, applying low energy radio frequency electrical current, which creates localized tumor destruction by heat. Fibroids are benign tumors, which grow in the uterus. Fibroids are the most common tumor in the reproductive years, and are 2-3 times more common among African American women.
Black Men Over Diagnosed with Schizophrenia: Black men are over-diagnosed with schizophrenia at least five times higher than any other group–a trend that dates back to the 1960s, according to new University of Michigan research. Metzl examined archives of Ionia State Hospital for the Criminally Insane and learned that black men, mainly from Detroit during the civil rights era, were taken there and often misdiagnosed with schizophrenia. Events at Ionia, located in a mostly white northern Michigan community, mirrored national conversations that linked the disease with blackness, madness and civil rights, he said. Many black men came to the hospital during the Detroit riots, dramatically increasing the facility’s black population. The criminalization of mental illness and misdiagnosis of schizophrenia meant many black men have been placed in prisons rather than psychiatric hospitals.
blackgirlgrown
