Toward an Understanding of Health Care Delay Among Minorities: Examining Health Care Behaviors Among Military Young-Adult Males
Abstract
The importance of eliminating health disparities in the United States has become a top priority in public health efforts. Ethnic minorities have historically different experiences and access to health care services that may influence their current attitudes and health behaviors. The military provides a unique opportunity to address these important questions. Military personnel are a racially diverse sample that has universal access to quality health care thereby removing access as one of the major barriers to utilization and controlling for SES. The purpose of this study was to compare delay in treatment seeking behaviors as related to knowledge of disease among African American, Hispanic American, and Caucasian active duty enlisted personnel. Two hundred ninety five enlisted males personnel (X=22.86 years; SD= 4.14) from a command within the continental U.S. completed the Illness Attitudes Scale (IAS; Kellner, 1986) to measure the participant s overall health-related worries and concerns, the Knowledge of Cancer Warning Signs inventory (KCWSI; Berman and Wanders man, 1991), and a number of questions developed to evaluate diabetes knowledge. Health care rules and behaviorswere also examined by a series of health care vignettes that described a pattern ofsymptoms for acute as well as chronic problems and the respondent indicated their typical response. Results indicated that there were no differences in knowledge of cancer(F (2, 258)=.29, p = .29) and diabetes (F (2, 272) = .19, p = .83) symptoms among theracial groups. Also, there were no differences in treatment experience in the medicalsetting among the racial groups (F (3, 283) = .22, p = .88). However, differences inconcern about bodily symptoms were found between minorities and Caucasians, withethnic minorities showing higher concern about bodily symptoms, worry about illnesses,and concern about disease (all p s < .05).
Document Details
- Document Type
- Technical Report
- Publication Date
- May 01, 2001
- Accession Number
- AD1012426
Entities
People
- Nicole A. Vaughn
Organizations
- Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences