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Found 176 results
  1. News Article
    A board director has publicly criticised his trust for its treatment of Muslim staff and patients. Mohammed Hussain posted on social media that some board members at Bradford Teaching Hospitals “are not heard and listened to”, and that there is a “dissonance” between its espoused values and the “lived experiences” of minority ethnic staff. Mr Hussain, a non-executive director since 2019, was responding to a post by CEO Mel Pickup, who had said the trust had a “variety of support offers for colleagues observing Ramadan”. He said there are “many examples” of Muslim families experiencing poor responses to complaints to the trust, while claiming that “outstanding” Muslim staff are having to “move out of the area to progress because they are not promoted internally”. The trust said its launching an investigation into the concerns raised by Mr Hussain. Read full story (paywalled) Source: HSJ, 12 March 2024
  2. News Article
    Minority ethnic people, women and people from deprived communities are at risk of poorer healthcare because of biases within medical tools and devices, a report has revealed. Among other findings, the Equity in Medical Devices: Independent Review has raised concerns over devices that use artificial intelligence (AI), as well as those that measure oxygen levels. The team behind the review said urgent action was needed. Prof Frank Kee, the director of the centre for public health at Queen’s University Belfast and a co-author of the review, said: “We’d like an equity lens on the entire lifecycle of medical devices, from the initial testing, to recruitment of patients either in hospital or in the community, into the early phase studies and the implementation in the field after they are licensed,.” The government-commissioned review was set up by Sajid Javid in 2022 when he was health secretary after concerns were raised over the accuracy of pulse oximeter readings in Black and minority ethnic people. The widely used devices were thrown into the spotlight due to their importance in healthcare during the Covid pandemic, where low oxygen levels were an important sign of serious illness. The report has confirmed concerns pulse oximeters overestimate the amount of oxygen in the blood of people with dark skin, noting that while there was no evidence of this affecting care in the NHS, harm has been found in the US with such biases leading to delayed diagnosis and treatment, as well as worse organ function and death, in Black patients. The team members stress they are not calling for the devices to be avoided. Instead the review puts forward a number of measures to improve the use of pulse oximeters in people of different skin tones, including the need to look at changes in readings rather than single readings, while it also provides advice on how to develop and test new devices to ensure they work well for patients of all ethnicities. Read full story Source: The Guardian, 11 March 2024
  3. Content Article
    A core responsibility of the NHS is to maintain the highest standards of safety and effectiveness of medical devices available for all patients in its care. Evidence has emerged, however, about the potential for racial and ethnic bias in the design and use of some medical devices commonly used in the NHS, and that some ethnic groups may receive sub-optimal treatment as a result. In response to these concerns, the UK Government commissioned this independent review on equity in medical devices. In its final report, the Review sets out the need for immediate action to tackle the impact of ethnic biases in the use of medical devices. Its findings and recommendations have also been published in a short animation. The Government’s response to the Review's 18 recommendations has also been published alongside its final report.
  4. News Article
    Areas across England where the highest proportion of ethnic minorities live have the poorest access to GPs, with experts attributing this disparity to an outdated model being used to determine funding. As of October 2023, there were 34 fully qualified full-time-equivalent GPs per 100,000 patients in the areas with the highest proportion of people from ethnic minority backgrounds, according to a Guardian analysis of NHS Digital and census data. This is 29% lower than the 48 general practitioners per 100,000 people serving neighbourhoods with the highest proportion of white British people. Although ethnic minorities tend to be younger than the white British population, minority ethnic areas still have the lowest number of GPs per person even when factors such as age, sex and health necessities are considered. Prof Miqdad Asaria at the London School of Economics department of health policy said it was “very concerning” that ethnic minorities “have systematically poorer access to primary care which is likely to be a key driver of current and future health inequalities”. “Primary care plays a crucial role in preventing disease, diagnosing and treating illness, and facilitating access to specialist or hospital treatment for people who need it,” he added. Read full story Source: The Guardian,15 February 2024
  5. News Article
    "Cultural and ethnic bias" delayed diagnosing and treating a pregnant black woman before her death in hospital, an investigation found. The probe was launched when the 31-year-old Liverpool Women's Hospital patient died on 16 March, 2023. Investigators from the national body the Maternity and Newborn Safety Investigations (MSNI) were called in after the woman died. A report prepared for the hospital's board said that the MSNI had concluded that "ethnicity and health inequalities impacted on the care provided to the patient, suggesting that an unconscious cultural bias delayed the timing of diagnosis and response to her clinical deterioration". "This was evident in discussions with staff involved in the direct care of the patient". The hospital's response to the report also said: "The approach presented by some staff, and information gathered from staff interviews, gives the impression that cultural bias and stereotyping may sometimes go unchallenged and be perceived as culturally acceptable within the Trust." Liverpool Riverside Labour MP Kim Johnson said it was "deeply troubling" that "the colour of a mother's skin still has a significant impact on her own and her baby's health outcomes". Read full story Source: BBC News, 16 February 2024
  6. Content Article
    Racial and ethnic disparities in health are substantial and persistent in the USA. They occur from the earliest years of life, are perpetuated by societal structures and systems, and profoundly affect children’s health throughout their lives. This series of articles in The Lancet Child & Adolescent Health summarises evidence on racial and ethnic inequities in the quality of paediatric care, outlines priorities for future research to better understand and address these inequities and discusses policy solutions to advance child health equity in the USA. Racial and ethnic inequities in the quality of paediatric care in the USA: a review of quantitative evidence Policy solutions to eliminate racial and ethnic child health disparities in the USA
  7. Content Article
    This report is divided into two sections. The first section is contextual and reviews literature, both national and international, that provides insights into the experiences of Black and Ethnic Minority (referred to in this report as BME) and internationally recruited nurse (IRNs). The second section focuses specifically on the literature related to health and social care regulatory bodies within the UK, and the reporting of professionals in relation to fitness to practise.
  8. Content Article
    The ethnicity data gap pertains to three major challenges to address ethnic health inequality: Under-representation of ethnic minorities in research Poor data quality on ethnicity Ethnicity data not being meaningfully analysed. These challenges are especially relevant for research involving under-served migrant populations in the UK. This study in BMC Public Health aimed to review how ethnicity is captured, reported, analysed and theorised within policy-relevant research on ethnic health inequities. The authors concluded that the multi-dimensional nature of ethnicity is not currently reflected in UK health research studies, where ethnicity is often aggregated and analysed without justification. Researchers should communicate clearly how ethnicity is operationalised for their study, with appropriate justification for clustering and analysis that is meaningfully theorised.
  9. Content Article
    National Voices is committed to tackling racial inequalities – in healthcare, health status, within their own organisations and across the charity sector. With unacceptable statistics, like Black women are four times more likely to die around pregnancy than White women, and Black babies are almost three times more likely to die than White babies – still now, in 2023 – the need for effective action could not be stronger.  
  10. News Article
    NHS “inaction” for more than a decade is causing unnecessary deaths of black, Asian and minority ethnic transplant patients, a report by MPs has concluded. An inquiry into organ donation in the UK found that minority ethnic and mixed heritage people faced a “double whammy of inequity”: they are more likely to need donors, because they are disproportionately affected by conditions such as sickle cell and kidney disease, and they are less likely to find the right blood, stem cell or organ match on donor registers. Matching tissue type is vital to the chances of successful treatment, and compatible donors who are not relations are more likely to be found among donors from a similar ethnic background. While there are more donors than in previous years, theall-party parliamentary group (APPG) for ethnicity transplantation and transfusion’s inquiry report says just 0.1% of blood donors, 0.5% of stem cell donors and less than 5% of organ donors are of minority ethnic or mixed background. As a result, white people are nearly twice as likely to find a stem cell donor and 20% more likely to find a kidney donor. The inquiry found a “staggering lack of consistent and detailed ethnicity data” within healthcare systems, which “undermines accountability and jeopardises the lives of those awaiting life-saving treatments”. Responding to the findings, Habib Naqvi, the chief executive of the NHS Race and Health Observatory, said such stark ethnic disparities in organ donor participation were of “grave concern” and required “more investment from health providers and targeted campaigns to raise awareness” to build trust in the healthcare system. Jabeer Butt, the chief executive of the Race Equality Foundation, said the inequalities were unacceptable. “Every person, regardless of ethnic background, deserves an equal chance at receiving life-saving transplants and donations when needed. This is a solvable problem, but it requires a shared commitment to action across government, health organisations and communities. Lives depend on it,” he said. Read full story Source: The Guardian, 4 December 2023
  11. News Article
    Black babies in England are almost three times more likely to die than white babies after death rates surged in the last year, according to figures that have led to warnings that racism, poverty and pressure on the NHS must be tackled to prevent future fatalities. The death rate for white infants has stayed steady at about three per 1,000 live births since 2020, but for black and black British babies it has risen from just under six to almost nine per 1,000, according to figures from the National Child Mortality Database, which gathers standardised data on the circumstances of children’s deaths. Infant death rates in the poorest neighbourhood rose to double those in the richest areas, where death rates fell. The mortality for Asian and Asian British babies also rose, by 17%. The annual data shows overall child mortality increased again between 2022 and 2023, with widening inequalities between rich and poor areas and white and black communities. Most deaths of infants under one year of age were due to premature births. Karen Luyt, the programme lead for the database and a professor of neonatal medicine at Bristol University, said many black and minority ethnic women were not registering their pregnancies early enough and the “system needs to reach them in a better way”. “There’s an element of racism and there’s a language barrier,” Luyt said. “Minority women often do not feel welcome. There’s cultural incompetence and our clinical teams do not have the skills to understand different cultures.” Read full story Source: The Guardian, 9 November 2023
  12. Content Article
    Medical defence organisation MDDUS's latest annual member attitude survey has found that many have experienced or witnessed persistent racist microaggressions at work. Almost two-thirds of International Medical Graduate members report they’ve been subject to racist microaggressions and have little faith in being heard and the issue being taken seriously. MDDU's 'We hear you' campaign aims to be a catalyst for positive change and help rebuild confidence in the way such abuses can be reported.
  13. Content Article
    A new guide to help health service trusts tackle racial discrimination in disciplinary procedures and promote inclusivity has been launched by NHS Providers.
  14. News Article
    Black, Asian and minority ethnic people experience longer waiting times, and are less likely to be in recovery after treatment, when accessing NHS mental health services compared with their white counterparts, a report has found. The research looked at 10 years’ worth of anonymised patient data from NHS Talking Therapies, formerly known as Improving Access to Psychological Therapies – an NHS programme that launched in 2008 to improve patient access to NHS mental health services. A total of 1.2 million people accessed NHS Talking Therapies services in 2021-22, and by 2024 the programme aims to help 1.9 million people in England with anxiety or depression to access treatment. The report, Ethnic Inequalities in Improving Access to Psychological Therapies, commissioned by the NHS Race and Health Observatory and undertaken by the National Collaborating Centre for Mental Health, found that people from black and minority ethnic backgrounds were less likely to go on to have at least one treatment session, despite having been referred by their GP, than their white counterparts. Dr Lade Smith, the president of the Royal College of Psychiatrists, said: “For far too long we have known that people from minoritised ethnic groups don’t get the mental healthcare they need. This review confirms, despite some improvements, it remains that access, experience and outcomes of talking therapies absolutely must get better, especially for Bangladeshi people. “There is progress, particularly for people from black African backgrounds, if they can get into therapy, but getting therapy in the first place continues to be difficult. This review provides clear recommendations about how to build on the improvements seen. I hope that decision-makers, system leaders and practitioners will act on these findings.” Read full story Source: The Guardian, 1 November 2023
  15. Content Article
    An independent review from the NHS Race & Health Observatory of services provided by NHS Talking Therapies has identified that psychotherapy services need better tailoring to meet the needs of Black and minoritised ethnic groups.
  16. Content Article
    Aortic valve replacement (AVR) is a life-saving procedure for symptomatic severe aortic stenosis (AS), which relieves symptoms, increases life expectancy and improves quality of life. Little is known about the rate of AVR provision by gender, race or social deprivation level in the NHS across England. However, a large analysis examining AVR on the health service in England – the first of its kind – reveals striking inequalities in its provision. Women, black and Asian people, and those living in the poorest parts of the country are much less likely to receive the life-saving procedure, the study shows. “In this large, national dataset, female gender, black or south Asian ethnicities and high deprivation were associated with significantly reduced odds of receiving AVR in England,” the authors wrote. Dr Clare Appleby, a consultant cardiologist at the Liverpool Heart and Chest hospital NHS foundation trust and an author of the study, said public health initiatives to understand and tackle these inequalities should be prioritised. “Severe symptomatic aortic stenosis is a serious disease that causes mortality and reduces quality of life for patients,” she said. “Left untreated it has a worse prognosis than many common metastatic cancers, with average survival being 50% at two years, and around 20% at five years.” Further research and public health initiatives to understand and address inequalities in the timely provision of AVR are important and should be prioritised in England.
  17. Content Article
    In April 2023, National Voices held a workshop with members, supported by The Disrupt Foundation, on the unequal impact of the Covid-19 pandemic. It explored how communities and groups were affected differently by both the virus itself and the measures brought in to control it.   It painted a grim picture of the ways in which the pandemic response exacerbated existing, deep-rooted inequalities across the UK and compounded the disadvantages experienced by people from minoritised communities, by disabled people and by people living with long term conditions.  Just some examples include people who are immunocompromised, who were asked to go into isolation for huge periods of time and still feel completely overlooked as control measures have been lifted. Or the use of DNRs (Do Not Resuscitate orders) which were disproportionately applied to people with learning disabilities.  With the Covid-19 Inquiry underway, it is imperative that we capture the lessons learnt from the pandemic, and use them to suggest action for the future.
  18. Content Article
    The latest data from the Office for National Statistics (ONS) provides the most comprehensive and up to date national profile of ethnic inequalities in mortality overall and from common physical conditions. It shows a complex picture of ethnic inequalities in mortality in England, with differences between people from ethnic minority and the White British groups, between different ethnic minority groups, and across different health conditions. This King's Fund blog looks at the complex interplay of factors drives ethnic differences in health.
  19. News Article
    Trusts have been told to ‘get their act together’ on health inequalities, after HSJ research suggested only a small minority have so far published data on disparities in waiting times between different patient groups. Planning guidance issued by NHS England in September 2021 said trusts’ board performance reports should include a disaggregation of waiting lists by ethnicity and deprivation group. Through freedom of information and media requests, HSJ attempted to obtain such data from the 20 trusts with the largest waiting lists, but only three currently appear to have met the requirement in full. The remainder either said they were still undertaking the work, were thinking about how to publish it, or failed to respond. Roger Kline, an academic researcher and former director of NHSE’s workforce race equality standard, said trusts should have been collecting and publishing the data for years. He said: “We know there are issues around health and healthcare of some groups of people, most notably in poor working class communities and black and minority ethnic communities. It shouldn’t be seen as an optional extra, this should be part of good public health work and good equitable healthcare provision." “This data should be on the trust website. It should be an active part of the conversations with local communities. Well done to the trusts that are pushing this forward. The ones that are not need to get their act together.” Read full story (paywalled) Source: HSJ, 3 May 2022
  20. News Article
    The American Academy of Pediatrics is attempting to ban race-based medical guidance which the organisation attributes to long-standing inequities in healthcare. In a statement on Monday, the AAP said: “Race is a historically-derived social construct that has no place as a biologic proxy. Over the years, the medical field has inaccurately applied race correction or race adjustment factors in its work, resulting in differential approaches to disease management and disparate clinical outcomes.” “Although it will continue to be important to collect clinical data disaggregated by race and ethnicity to help characterize the differential lived experiences of our patients, unwinding the roots of race-based medicine, debunking the fallacy of race as a biologic proxy, and replacing this flawed science with legitimate measures of the impact of racism and social determinants on health outcomes is necessary and long overdue,” the academy added. A re-examination of AAP treatment recommendations that began before George Floyd’s 2020 murder by police in Minneapolis, and intensified after it and the resulting nationwide protests, has doctors concerned that Black youngsters have been under-treated and overlooked, said Joseph Wright, lead author of the new policy and chief health equity officer at the University of Maryland medical system, a network of hospitals. According to Wright, the academy has begun to scrutinise its “entire catalog,” including guidelines, educational materials, textbooks and newsletter articles. The academy went on to recommend a series of policies to medical societies, institutions and pediatricians. “All professional organizations and medical specialty societies should advocate for the elimination of race-based medicine in any form,” it said. It urged institutions to collaborate with learner-facing organizations such as the Accreditation Council on Continuing Medical Education to expose more people to health equity content with a “specific focus on the elimination of race-based medicine”. Read full story Source: The Guardian, 2 May 2022
  21. News Article
    During the peak of the omicron variant wave of the coronavirus this winter, Black adults in the United States were hospitalised at rates higher than at any moment in the pandemic, according to a report published last week by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Black adults were four times as likely to be hospitalised compared with White adults during the height of the omicron variant surge, which started in mid-December and continued through January, the report said. In January, the CDC found, hospitalisation rates for Black patients reached the highest level for any racial or ethnic group since the dawn of the pandemic. As the highly transmissible omicron variant usurped the delta variant’s dominance, people who were unvaccinated were 12 times more likely to be hospitalised than those who were vaccinated and boosted against the coronavirus, according to the report. And fewer Black adults had been immunised compared with White adults, said the report, which analysed hospitalization rates in 99 counties in 14 states. Teresa Y. Smith saw evidence of the phenomenon outlined in the CDC’s report as she treated patients as an emergency physician at SUNY Downstate in Brooklyn. She has felt the crush of the pandemic’s unequal impact since the pre-vaccine waves but has contended with the consequences of health disparities for much longer. Her hospital sits in a heavily Black and Latino borough, where — as in so many communities of color across the country — social, political, economic and environmental factors erode health and shorten lives. In December, she watched as the number of cases and admissions resulting from the omicron variant “just exploded in a short, short amount of time,” saying then, “there is no subtlety to it.” And while the vaccinated patients she treated were less likely to be “lethally sick,” many still needed to be admitted to the hospital. Read full story Source: The Washington Post, 18 March 2022
  22. News Article
    The NHS has been accused of “shocking and systemic” racism during the pandemic as black healthcare workers say they were given poor PPE and pushed into the Covid frontline first. Hundreds of black and brown healthcare staff across the UK have spoken to academics at Sheffield Hallam University about their experiences of racism during the pandemic. The accounts raised issues of racism within the health service which led to black and brown nurses and midwives being put at greater risk than their white colleagues, due to poorer PPE, training, workload and shift patterns. Rosalie Sanni-Ajose, a senior theatre practitioner, who worked across multiple London NHS hospitals through an agency called Yourworld told The Independent: “During the pandemic, we found that most of us (black agency nurses) have been placed in ITU to look after Covid patients are on a Continuous positive airway pressure (CPAP) machine or the ventilator." “Then when I work in A&E, they divided areas into sections - green area, red area, and the normal areas. So some of the ethnic minority staff were then put in the red areas all the time. Further some of us, we have comorbidities like asthma, or diabetes, or have an exemption that has been clearly stated they not allowed to work there.” Through its research, which involved 350 black and brown nurses, midwives and healthcare staff across the UK, Sheffield Hallam University found 77% of respondents said they’d been treated unfairly when they challenged racism. Just over 50% of the respondents said they’d experienced unfair treatment in the pandemic in relation to Covid deployment, PPE or risk assessment. One third have left their job as a result of racism, while more than half have experienced poor mental health due to the racism they experienced. The academic team, lead by Professor Anandi Ramamurthy said the healthcare professionals’ reports reveal “a story of systematic neglect and harassment which predates the pandemic.” Read full story Source: The Independent, 5 March 2022
  23. News Article
    Stark disparities in cancer rates between different ethnic groups have been laid bare in new research showing black people are twice as likely to get prostate cancer while white people have double the chance of getting skin and lung cancers. The analysis of NHS Digital cancer registration data by Cancer Research UK provides the most complete recording ever of cancer rates by ethnicity in England, offering crucial data on how some rates vary. The results are published in the British Journal of Cancer. White people in England are more than twice as likely to get some types of cancer, including melanoma skin cancer, oesophageal, bladder and lung cancers compared with people from black, Asian or mixed ethnic backgrounds, according to the research. Black people are almost three times more likely to get myeloma and almost twice as likely to get prostate cancer compared with white people. The study also found that black people are more likely to get stomach and liver cancers, and Asian people are more likely to get liver cancers. Genetics are thought to play a part in some of the findings, Cancer Research UK said. For example, white people are more likely to get skin cancer because they tend to burn more easily in the sun. Preventable risk factors also appear to be involved, the charity added, as white people are more likely than most minority ethnic groups to smoke or be overweight or obese. These are the two largest risk factors in developing cancer and help explain why white people are more likely to get some types of cancer than other ethnic groups. Read full story Source: The Guardian, 2 March 2022
  24. News Article
    A new pregnancy screening tool cuts the risk of baby loss among women from black, Asian and ethnic minority backgrounds to the same level as white women, research suggests. The app calculates a woman's individual risk of pregnancy problems. In a study of 20,000 pregnant women, baby death rates in ethnic groups were three times lower than normal when the tool was used. Experts say the new approach can help reduce health inequalities. The screening tool is already in use at St George's Hospital in London and is being tried out at three other maternity units in England, with hopes it could be rolled out to 20 centres within two years. Researchers from Tommy's National Centre for Maternity Improvement, led by the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists and the Royal College of Midwives, developed the new tool. Professor Basky Thilaganathan, who led the research team at St George's Hospital, said the new approach could "almost eliminate a large source of the healthcare inequality facing black, Asian and minority ethnic pregnant women". "We can personalise care for you and reduce the chances of having a small baby, pre-eclampsia and losing your baby," he said. The current system of a tick-box checklist to assess pregnancy risk has been around for 70 years, and is limited. The new digital tool, which uses an algorithm to calculate a woman's personal risk, can detect high-risk women more accurately and prevent complications in pregnancy, the researchers say. Both pregnant women and maternity staff can upload information on their pregnancy and how they are feeling to the app during antenatal appointments and at other times. Dr Edward Morris, president of the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists, said it was "unacceptable" that black, Asian and minority ethnic women faced huge inequalities on maternity outcomes. "The digital tool provides a practical way to support women with personalised care during pregnancy and make informed decisions about birth. Read full story Read Tommy's press release Source: BBC News, 28 February 2022
  25. News Article
    The NHS has been accused by a major charity of failing to address the emerging gap in Covid booster vaccine coverage for racialised communities. Blood Cancer UK has told The Independent it has “serious concerns” over what it claims is a “shocking” lack of urgency from the NHS in addressing the gap in booster vaccine doses for immunocompromised people from black and minority ethnic communities. The charity has said NHS England has failed to set out any “concrete” plans since it revealed 84% of immunocompromised people from a white British background had three vaccine doses by mid-December, compared to just 43% of immunocompromised people from a Pakistani background. The news comes after the government announced people over 75 and immunocompromised children would be eligible to receive a fourth Covid vaccine by Spring. According to an analysis published by Open Safely, a team of data scientists at Oxford University, of those who are part of the shielding population, as of the 22 February just 72% of Black people have had their booster does, and 73% of south Asian people. This compares to 89% of white people. NHS England has highlighted a number of actions it is taking to address the situation such as using pop-up sites within communities and providing free transport. Speaking with The Independent chief executive of Blood Cancer UK Gemma Peters, said: “We have serious concerns about how the poor roll-out of third doses for the immunocompromised has left people from some communities much less well-protected than people from a white British background. But while it is deeply troubling that a racial disparity in access to third vaccine doses has been allowed to develop, just as shocking has been NHS England’s apparent lack of urgency in addressing it." Read full story Source: The Independent, 25 February 2022
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