Snapshots

Snapshots

During our work on health reform, we sought to make the system better by increasing health care providers’ training in cultural competency. Being “cultural competent” means that physicians, nurses lab techs, and others should understand and respect the cultural beliefs, traditions, and assumptions of the people they’re serving. Sounds sensible, right? Until recently, however, there wasn’t much evidence that medical professionals could actually learn this information in the classroom, as opposed to learning it on the job from actual patients (which even if effective, isn’t much fun for the patients who have to act as educators). We’re heartened by a new study that examined 109 third-year medical students who completed a comprehensive cultural competence curriculum.  The study found that these students actually learned: Students scored 19% better on a test of their knowledge after the intervention, as opposed to students who merely took the test twice & improved 4%. So, let’s go, advocates – start organizing to insist that all health professional training programs include cultural competency in their subject matter.
Journal of the National Medical Association, December 2009

Publicly funded family planning clinics are struggling to meet the needs of a growing number of women who want to prevent pregnancy and need help paying for contraceptives and clinic visits. According to a new survey, 67% of a representative sample of clinics across the U.S. report that more women sought contraceptive services in 2009 than in 2008. This is no surprise, as economic downturns lead many people to put off child-bearing. Yet, the current recession has also led to significant funding cuts at the same time that the need for services has grown. Nearly half of clinics (48%) reported staff layoffs or hiring freezes; 32% cut back the number of contraceptive methods offered.  If we didn’t already have enough examples of why we need reform to ensure that everyone has access to care, here’s another one.
Guttmacher Institute, December 2009

When proponents of menopause HT talk about the huge number of women who quit taking HT after the Women’s Health Initiative results were announced in 2002, they often say women are “confused” about HT. They argue that HT is still the best treatment for hot flashes and night sweats, and that women could only refuse to take it because they’re confused and just don’t understand?  We’ve always known that women are very capable of understanding information about their bodies and medical treatments. We knew that many women stopped taking HT because they learned they had been given HT for unproven uses like preventing heart disease or Alzheimer’s.  A new study shows that the women most likely to stop taking HT (or decide not to start) after 2002 were those most affected by the lessons learned from the WHI – women with risk factors for cardiovascular disease. HT use declined 19% among women with cardiovascular disease compared to a 3% decline among low-risk women, according to this study. These women know that HT doesn’t help prevent heart disease and they made the smart decision to avoid it. Congrats from us to you – and don’t let anyone tell you you’re “confused”.
American Journal of Public Health December 2009