Obstetrics Research Paper

Improved Essays
Health and Illness in Diverse Cultures
Tabytha Balash
Ohio University

Introduction
Obstetrics is special specialty that cares for millions of people each year across numerous cultures. Obstetrics is not just one individual, but care for mother and baby. Caring for individuals of another culture and ethnic background can be difficult due to different cultural practices and predisposed genetic health conditions. This paper will discuss the cultural background of Aisha, a pregnant African-American female in her early twenties with hypertension, and how she perceives her health. Next, the paper will discuss the actual issue that Aisha has hypertension, and does not have the knowledge or finical means to seek medical care, therefore, endangering
…show more content…
Churches are main organization for health promotional programs, and the first source of support for low-income African-American population (Carter-Edwards et al., 2012). The prevention and treatment of chronic disease of African-American’s are difficult because their cultural belief is to turn to elders for health care decisions, the church pastor, and to nature for healing …show more content…
Aisha can be educated through the use of outside resources such as community outreach programs, home health care, programs through her church, dieticians to control her diet, and her general doctor, and her Obstetrician on the effects of hypertension. Aisha can be connected with her church group to help cover the cost of her medications, and connected to a social worker to help her apply for state aid. These interventions would allow Aisha to make educated decision about her health, her unborn child’s, and her son’s health. She will have a better understanding of the hypertension and the affects on the body. She will have a better understanding that hypertension can occur at any age. There are community networks that are being developed to help support faith-based organization. One example is The Community Empower Network (CEN), which was develop in 2005 to establish wellness centers, health ministries, to train lay health workers, and to provide health screenings (Carter-Edwards et al.,

Related Documents

  • Great Essays

    There is a problem in healthcare where racial and ethnic disparities exist. Despite the abundance of healthcare facilities, technology and pharmacology and other aspects to which the U.S. is envied by others, something that should be accessible to everyone, is not. The quality and improvement of health care have been a long- standing and persistent issue of national discussions in the United States for years. This problem has negatively impacted African American women because there is a disparity of access and quality of care that they are receiving. Poor outcomes in health care, based on race or ethnic background exist in every level of the American health care system.…

    • 1554 Words
    • 7 Pages
    Great Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Book Critique: The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down Culture creates morals, values, and beliefs within an individual, and these characteristics must be understood and respected. Anne Fadiman brings this issue to light in her book, The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down. Common culture-barriers in the medical field can cause medical malpractice, disagreements on necessary procedures, and religion malpractice. Throughout her novel, Fadiman explains that the difficulties in cross-cultural treatment is due to two cultures having different morals and beliefs, and of course a language-barrier between the doctor(s) and patient(s).…

    • 787 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    According to CDC Center of Disease Control nearly 70 million American adults are suffering from hypertension. According to mayo clinic staff Hypertension is condition where the force of the blood against the artery walls is high enough, which could cause health complications such as heart diseases. Blood pressure is measured by the amount of blood the heart pumps and the amount of resistance of blood flow in your arteries. The more blood the heart pumps and the narrower the arteries get, the higher the blood pressure. You could have hypertension without showing any symptoms for years, but there will be continuous damage to the blood vessels and heart.…

    • 1209 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Superior Essays

    The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down is a book that highlights the struggles between two cultures in healthcare. The lack of understanding and communication lead to a medical tragedy for Hmong child Lia Lee. The story starts with the Lee’s forced immigration to America and talks about Lia being born with epilepsy. As the story unfolds there are many challenges that both cultures face in attempt to provide the best care for Lia. The family has very strong religious and cultural beliefs and the Western medicine only see the biomedicine side of the care Lia needs.…

    • 1576 Words
    • 7 Pages
    Superior Essays
  • Great Essays

    Working Cures Book Review

    • 1720 Words
    • 7 Pages

    The most common conflicts in society are due to misunderstandings, regardless of one’s cultural background. On the books Working Cures: Healing, Health, and Power on Southern Slave Plantations by Sharla M. Fett and Surviving HIV/AIDS in the Inner City: How Resourceful Latinas Beat the Odds by Sabrina Chase, the authors provide cases which reflect the failure of medical treatment provided by physicians due to the fact that it is not able to adjust to their patient’s needs. On the book Working cures, the slaves of plantations completely believed in “conjuration… also called ‘‘hoodoo’’ or ‘‘rootwork,’’ African American practice of healing, harming, and protection performed through the ritual harnessing of spiritual forces.’’ (Fett, p. 85)…

    • 1720 Words
    • 7 Pages
    Great Essays
  • Improved Essays

    A person’s health literacy is determined by that person’s capacity to obtain, process, and understand basic health information and services needed to make the appropriate health decisions. Two of the biggest influences that can determine a person’s health literacy are culture and education. In “The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down” by Anne Fadiman and “The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks” by Rebecca Skloot, there are many displays of how the roles of culture and education impact the lives of these two ethnic families. In “The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down” the effects of culture and education has an adverse effect on Lia Lee’s, the central character, life.…

    • 1596 Words
    • 7 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    For many years there has been a tremendous gap between health related diseases among the different racial groups. For example, some of the health diseases argued and researched over the years include: cardiovascular disease, cancer, and diabetes. In America, research has always led to the fact that black African Americans tend to have a higher mortality rate than those that are white. However, throughout the studies of racial inequality between health there is a question that comes into place as to whether or not "fundamental biological differences" is a cause of the health related problems that some people get. Through research it is shown that biological differences isn't a leading cause in the different health issues among race, social economic…

    • 1001 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    6. Racial health disparities, like racial income and wealth disparities, are clearly present in our society. Black Americans have greater risk of chronic diseases such as diabetes, heart disease, and cancer (lecture 10). Blacks also have far higher rates of hypertension from high blood pressure. Like other types of inequality, there is a debate over where the root of this discrepancy lies.…

    • 776 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Great Essays

    Although statistical data and research shows there are healthcare disparities as it relates to minorities, much isn’t done to change negative patterns. However, researchers’ have chosen to examine the healthcare racial inequalities of African Americans. Cultural differences, and racial conscious and unconscious are factors that contribute to the gap in African American health. Therefore, collecting only medical data and physician behaviors towards certain diagnosis, is not enough to determine or conclude that there aren’t any deep rooted unforeseen components that play into racialist thinking by physicians.…

    • 2046 Words
    • 9 Pages
    Great Essays
  • Great Essays

    The United States of America is sometimes referred to as a melting pot of cultures; though America does house a wide range of cultures, ethnicities and religions these things do not quite melt together as the saying implies. Culture is a concept that is exhibited by a group of people with similar values and includes thoughts, actions and beliefs among many other things. A person’s culture is learned as they grow. This process is not limited to childhood; culture can be learned at any time such as when moving to a different region, joining the workforce or any other social group. The very nature of who a person is is continually being formed by their culture.…

    • 2032 Words
    • 9 Pages
    Great Essays
  • Improved Essays

    The Black Male Yoga Initiative (“BMYI”) is organized to educate, engage, and empower Black men in all communities. Our audience demographic is straightforward, we have a primary focus on training men of color, ages 16 to 65, as certified yoga teachers, however, we do not exclude members of any race, age, gender or ethnicity — we merely want men of color to be clear that holistic health care practice is for “us too.” While the outcome of becoming a yoga teacher also creates workforce development, in that each successful candidate becomes a registered yoga teacher with The Yoga Alliance, capable of teaching anywhere in the United States, an equally important application is that we help build more informed communities. BMYI collects data in collaboration with the communities and organizations we serve, to build successful programs that address present issues. The result is an alternate base of holistic knowledge, performance measures and assessments, which, ultimately help create policies to ameliorate gaps in health care and human services for…

    • 568 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Sarah Wilkes: Paper 1: Prompt 1 Culture has a huge impact on a patient’s decision to seek medical consultation. Each ethnic group brings their own values and perspective into the health care system, that differ from that of the traditional American culture. The United States is continuously becoming more culturally and ethnically diverse. In today’s society physicians are faced with the challenge of dealing with emotions while taking into cultural difference.…

    • 1023 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    When conducting various tests on low birth weights I found low birth weight to be defined as a baby born weighing less than 5.5 pounds. After running various queries and tests on the data of file of women with low birth weights, I have found that many of the women of other ethnicity suffer from having babies with low birth weights. Although Caucasian women are not too far behind in having babies with low birth weight. Astonishing that, Black women were at a significantly lower percentage of women who resulted in low birth weight babies. Furthermore, black women are generally associated with having low-birth weight babies due to several medical risk factors as well as everyday risk factors.…

    • 1811 Words
    • 7 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Superior Essays

    The article “The Effects of Attitudes on Teenage Premarital Pregnancy and its Resolution” seeks to answer the question of how the influence of attitudes and personality variables increases the probability of teenage premarital pregnancy and once the pregnancy occurs what is the resolution. In the 1980’s teenage premarital pregnancy emerged as a national concern and remains the topic of debates because it violates social norms. The amount of public assistance is a negative consequence of the epidemic of young unwed mothers. According to the article, substantial tax dollars are spent for income support, health care, and social services. Finding the answer to what causes premarital pregnancy could help to determine what changes in society could be made to alleviate the need for public assistance and improve the negative focus of premarital teenage pregnancy and pregnancy resolution.…

    • 936 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Superior Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Who Owns the Future in the Medical Industry In the medical industry, robots are becoming an important part (Anandan). They do not work on their own, but are controlled by the human to perform the work (Anandan). What is the impact on your job when robots are cheap? “Robots are never going to be cheap” Newton Medical Center Obstetrics doctor, Kent Bradley said in an interview (Bradley). If they do become cheaper, they will be more available to smaller hospitals (Bradley).…

    • 1201 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Improved Essays