The Health Disparities Podcast

When healthcare quality management expert Donna Kurek made the switch to a more rural hospital system, she realized that there exists a whole different set of social determinants to consider in Appalachia, especially in the context of bundled payments.

Physician Assistants are a relatively new specialty created in response to the shortage of primary care physicians in rural areas, and the PA profession is now well established with over 100,000 graduates of accredited PA programs.

Orthopedist Dr. Eric Santos sees a diverse range of patients in his two Texas practices in Corpus Christi and McAllen, which have very different patient populations. He works hard to provide culturally competent healthcare services to his Hispanic patients, which includes providing consultations in both Spanish and English.

Rural Wyoming is a beautiful place to live, but those wide-open spaces on the frontier create a number of health disparities, with the presence of Native American reservations, COVID-19, and hospital closures adding more complexity.

Operation Change is a community intervention designed to address chronic health conditions and to mitigate some of the related social determinants of health, for women in mid-life and later-life. A fundamental part of the program is to help participants find their own sources of motivation for creating a healthier lifestyle.

Operation Change provided Lynn with invaluable knowledge and a new support network. In her 70s and busy in retirement with volunteer work, Lynn became more conscious of her diet, her physical activity levels, and she became a FitBit enthusiast.

Mt. Vernon, N.Y. resident Olivia found new motivation to take care of her own health by learning about health disparities in her community.

Bringing clinical research to Latinx communities has become a joint mission for today’s podcast guests, Dr Fabian Sandoval and Dr Gustavo Corrales.

The relatively low uptake of flu vaccinations in Black and Hispanic communities is a longstanding health disparity and a public health concern. What if this pattern is repeated for the coronavirus, which is already having a disparate impact?

Meet Freda from St. Louis. Over many sedentary years Freda experienced chronic conditions such as back pain, diabetes and high blood pressure and she found it difficult to follow her doctor’s directions to exercise and lose weight. “I desperately needed to garner better health habits, or I would have deterioration in my conditions and need […]