Utah Department of Health Office of Health Disparities
The Connection: News about overcoming health disparities in Utah

Thursday, August 18, 2011

New Study: National Awareness of Health Disparities

 A new study examines how much Americans know about health disparities.

Awareness of Racial and Socioeconomic Health Disparities in the United States: The National Opinion Survey on Health and Health Disparities, 2008-2009

Abstract 
Introduction
Recent initiatives aim to improve public awareness of health disparities. However, little research has actually documented the US public’s awareness of racial/ethnic and socioeconomic health disparities. We sought to determine 1) whether the US public is aware of racial, educational, and income disparities in health, 2) whether awareness differs across these disparity domains, and 3) what respondent characteristics are associated with awareness of racial, educational, and income disparities in health.

Methods
We conducted the National Opinion Survey on Health and Health Disparities with 2,791 US adults. We asked respondents to answer questions about disparities in health between 1 of several pairs of population subgroups: African Americans versus whites, non–high school graduates versus high school graduates, high school graduates versus college graduates, the poor versus the middle class, or the middle class versus the rich. We used χ2 tests and logistic regression to compare correlates of respondents’ awareness of disparities across the different pairs of population subgroups.

Results
Most respondents were aware of health disparities between the poor and middle class (73%); fewer were aware of health disparities between African Americans and whites (46%). Although respondents recognized that education is associated with many positive life outcomes, they were less aware of the link between education and health. Respondents who were younger, less educated, lower-income, healthier, or politically conservative were less likely to be aware of health disparities.

Conclusion
Public awareness of disparities in health differs depending on both the type of disparity and the characteristics of the individual respondent.

For the complete article, see http://www.cdc.gov/pcd/issues/2011/jul/10_0166.htm

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