Culture of Native Americans

ASIAN-AmericanS & SOCIOECONOMIC ISSUES OF POVERTY, ACCESS TO QUALITY HEALTHCARE SERVICES, FAMILY PLANNING AND CONTRACEPTION PRACTICES

The objective of this study is to examine the socioeconomic issues of poverty, access to quality health care services, family planning and contraception devices among Asian-Americans.

Today's health care environment in the United States is a setting with a great diversity of patients of many race, ethnic and cultural groups and today's practitioners must be knowledgeable about providing health care services that are effective and that assist their patients.

Family Planning Disparities

The work of Dehlendorf, Rodriguez, Levy, Borrero and Stinauer (2010) reports in regards to family planning disparities, "Prominent racial/ethnic and socioeconomic disparities in rates of unintended pregnancy, abortion, and unintended births exist in the United States. These disparities can contribute to the cycle of disadvantage experienced by specific demographic groups when women are unable to control their fertility as desired. In this review we consider three factors which contribute to disparities in family planning outcomes: patient preferences and behaviors, health care system factors, and provider related factors. Through addressing barriers to access to family planning services, including abortion and contraception, and working to ensure that all women receive patient-centered reproductive health care, health care providers and policy makers can substantially improve the ability of women from all racial/ethnic and socioeconomic backgrounds to make informed decisions about their fertility." (p.1)

II. Study Clearly Demonstrates Differences in Frequency of Use of Contraception

The work of Farrid, Siddique, Bachman, Janevic, and Pichika (2013) conducted a study that sought to understand the diverse ethnicities of all women that were in receipt of health care in November 2011 and 2012 in New Jersey. The study was a cross sectional study that used chi-squaring to report the frequencies of the use of contraception in a sampling of 42 South Asian respondents and 143 non-South Asian respondents the findings of the study include that "South Asians are statistically significantly less likely to routinely use contraception and that gaps in contraceptive knowledge appear to stem from multiple barriers, including family opposition and pressure from spouse or in-laws to have children, cultural prohibitions, fear of side effects and misinformation, lack of education/knowledge about contraceptives and difficulty in accessing contraception. These gaps in contraceptive knowledge were also found to be multigenerational, despite higher levels of education generally seen in the South Asian population." (p.1)

The study concludes by recommending that nurses and practitioners providing care for South Asian women critically need to "acknowledge both the barriers and the lack of contraceptive knowledge in this population and provide culturally competent family planning information to them during all women's health encounters." (Farrid, Siddique, Bachman, Janevic, and Pichika, 2013, p. 1)

III. Service Provision in the Form of 'Health' Care Rather than 'Social Service'

Mitchell (1974) reports a study that was carried out in the Los Angeles Regional Family Planning Council involving attendance at a seminar by Indian-Americans, Mexican-Americans, Asian-Americans, and Black-Americans in order to gauge their beliefs about the use of birth control. The study reports specifically "some fears and misunderstandings relative to birth control were voiced. The timidity of recent Chinese immigrants was mentioned. Male reluctance to use birth control out of a sense of machismo was mentioned in relation to Black- and Mexican-Americans. The conclusion was that, when birth control methods are adequately explained, women of all ethnic groups are willing to use them. To allay fears, suspicions, and concerns, family planning should be presented to minority communities as a health service and not a social service." (p.1)