What are some of the reasons people delay or avoid medical care? There are several reasons why people may delay or avoid seeking medical care. Some common reasons include: Fear or anxiety: Many individuals may be afraid of receiving a diagnosis or treatment, leading them to avoid seeking medical care altogether. Cost: Financial constraints can be a significant barrier to accessing healthcare services. High medical expenses, lack of insurance, or limited coverage can deter individuals from seeking necessary care. Lack of awareness: Some people may need to be made aware of the importance of seeking medical care, or may need to recognize the symptoms of a health condition. Stigma: Certain health conditions, such as mental health disorders, may …show more content…
Here are two common obstacles and their effects. Accessibility: Limited access to healthcare facilities, particularly in rural or underserved areas, can make it challenging for individuals to reach a health professional. This can result in delayed or avoided care, leading to worsening health conditions or missed opportunities for early intervention. Language and cultural barriers: Language differences and cultural norms can create communication challenges between patients and healthcare providers. This can lead to misunderstandings, misdiagnosis, and decreased trust in the healthcare system, ultimately discouraging individuals from seeking care (Ogden, 2019). Discuss potential problems with delaying or avoiding medical care and possible solutions for improving help-seeking behavior. Delaying or avoiding medical care can have several potential problems. Worsening health conditions: Ignoring symptoms or delaying treatment can result in the progression of a health condition, leading to further complications and poorer outcomes. Emergencies: Some health issues, such as heart attacks or strokes, require immediate medical attention. Delaying care in such cases can be life-threatening. Increased healthcare costs: Delaying medical care often leads to more complex health issues that require extensive treatment, resulting in higher healthcare costs for individuals and the healthcare
Racial and ethnic inequalities in healthcare results in non-white patients receiving lower quality care that White patients. Additionally, people who speak limited English encounter more communication issues with doctors and nurses that people whose primary language is English. (AHRQ, 2011). Consequently, as people with chronic conditions utilize more healthcare services, they are more likely to complain of issues with the doctor-patient relationship. They feel as though they are not able to participate in their care, their doctors do not allow them to contribute to their medical decisions and they feel like doctors are not disclosing all information related to care. People who encounter this type of cultural ignorance become dissatisfied with their treatment and overall healthcare experience and are at high risk for negative
I know numerous East Africans and other minorities who fear and put off going to the hospital or clinic simply because they feel no one truly understands them on a more personal level and that their needs can’t and won’t be met entirely. According to the American Medical Association over 55% of health care providers agreed that, “minority patients generally receive lower quality health care” due to the lack of cultural competence. Those of different cultural backgrounds feel uneasy due to communication barriers and the lack of cultural competency amongst some health care providers. As a Somali-speaking nurse, I feel Somali patients, along with those of varying cultural backgrounds would be able to establish that sense of ease that’s needed when entering a health care facility or without having to feel the shame of having an interpreter hear about their personal health issues. According to Hospitals in Pursuit of Excellence,
... cultural barriers to care. Journal of General Internal Medicine, 18(1), 44-52. Retrieved from http://proxy.samuelmerritt.edu:2106/pmc/articles/PMC1494812/
According to Penner et al. (2013), there are various causes of healthcare disparities, such as socioeconomic status; this results to poor healthcare services for people with low socioeconomic status, as people with low pay find it difficult to leave their work to seek healthcare help, or to afford healthcare insurance (p.4). The second cause is language proficiency. The language barriers faced by the immigrant plays a role in the healthcare disparities among the racial or ethnic minority patients. Another cause is health literacy. The levels of the health literacy among the foreign born individuals can be influenced by their higher level of distrust of the healthcare providers and healthcare system than they have towards Caucasian people. This, in turn, leads them to seek healthcare information less often than their Caucasian counterparts, thus hindering the provision of quality services, as well as limiting the foreign patients’ ability to manage their health conditions effectively. The foreigners’ failure to easily accept the information provided to them by healthcare providers puts them at risk. Disentangling the role of health literacy in racial healthcare disparities from the effects of racial attitudes and beliefs is often hard (Penner et al,
Each year, millions of people go without any source of reliable coverage. Lack of health insurance coverage is most often the result of a combination of things. These factors include employment status, financial conditions, and even health problems. (Feldman 2012) These three things can be seen as reasons why coverage can be difficult to obtain.
The goal of this lesson is to explore how we can improve communication to eliminate language barriers between healthcare providers and patients in our organization and to establish culturally and linguistically appropriate goals, that provide safe, equal, and quality care to all our clients regardless of race, ethnic, or socioeconomic status. At the end of this lesson we should be
Causes for not having health care may be many such as lack of social security, lack of extra money, or negligence. Automobile and motorcycle accidents are one of the major causes of the gargantuan amount of people in need of organ transplants.
Many factors such as sociocultural, financial and structural issues create barriers to healthcare access for individuals living in rural America. Sociocultural factors include self-reliance, education, language and beliefs; financial factors include inadequate health insurance, income and resources; structural issues include the physical distance to travel, ability to travel and time to travel to healthcare facilities or healthcare professionals (Graves, 2008).
Chronic illness issues can include managing their illness, the cost of taking care of the illness, etc. Many people who suffer from a chronic illness suffer a lot trying to manage their illness on a daily basis. According to a website called NCOA.org, “About 80% of older adults have one chronic disease. 68.4% of Medicare beneficiaries have two or more chronic diseases and 36.4% have four or more. Chronic diseases can affect a person’s ability to perform important activities, restricting their engagement in life and their enjoyment of family and friends”
The other problem involves access to health care. Americans enjoy limited or no access to health care. Many efforts have been made to reform this, but still many people are left without access to the care. These two problems are related to the fact that if the health care industry gets too high, of course, people will no longer be able to have access to it. The higher prices are, the lower access people have to it.
An important indicators of potential access to health care is the characteristics of the health care system (Aday, 1989). One characteristic mentioned during discussion is the ethnicity and language of the care takers. From experience, I know that immigrants tend to flock to other immigrants, especially if they are from the same homeland. Why go have medical checkups from a person who speaks a different language and risk having a misdiagnosis?
In both country one of the barriers is language barrier which can be very difficult to anybody who does not know the language. If there is communication problem then there will be a big problem in getting proper healthcare
Denial of the problem. Sometimes patients are diagnosed with a disease or condition and they easily ignore it. This is true for diseases that are asymptomatic, which means symptoms of the condition or disease are not noticeable in the patient. For instance, some patients with high blood pressure may not show symptoms that get in the way of everyday life. Some patients may not even know they have the condition until they go to the doctor for a follow up appointment. This makes it easy for patients to ignore the prescribed treatment regimens.
Communication between healthcare providers and patients is key to providing safe, high quality care. Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 indicates that all federally funded programs need to provide meaningful access to care for limited English proficient (LEP) individuals (HHS.gov). LEP individuals are those “who do not speak English as their primary language and who have a limited ability to read, speak, write or understand English” (LEP.gov). Even though Title VI has been in effect for the last five decades, language barriers between providers and immigrants with LEP is still an ongoing issue. It has been well-documented and well-researched that language barriers adversely affect access to health care (Schwei et al., 2016).
CHAPTER ONE: Introduction 1.1Back ground: The processes involved in making decision to seek health care are not’ fully Understood. According to Harris and Gutman any behavior of individuals that promotes, protects or maintains one’s health regardless of actual or perceived health status is known as health care seeking behavior (2). Health seeking behavior is preceded by a decision making process that is further governed by individual and/or household behavior, community norms and expectations as well as provider related characteristics and behavior. For this reason the nature of health care seeking is not homogenous depending on cognitive and non-cognitive factors that call for a contextual analysis of health care seeking behavior.