Increased attention has been focused on the use of racial and ethnic categories in public health research and surveillance in recent years. This attention, however, has done more to increase the collective awareness of the difficulties inherent in these classification schemes than to resolve either the theoretical or practical problems. It has been recognized for many years that health outcomes for a particular ethnic population must be seen as an interaction between genetically determined factors and socially mediated exposures. The operational meaning of these concepts remains poorly defined, however. Although the general biologic construct of race and ethnicity appears straightforward, appearance is deceiving and the technical requirements that allow formulation of a rigorous and objective working definition have never been fully developed. The social factors that influence ethnic health differentials are perhaps better understood in practical terms; measurement of many of the relevant variables remains difficult, however. In this article an attempt is made to outline the implications of the new developments in molecular biology for the concept of race, and to provide an illustrative example of the continued evolution of the social determinants of ethnicity.
Historically black colleges and universities have educated significant numbers of black students preparing for careers in medicine. These institutions have the potential to make even greater contributions to the pool of black medical school applicant...
A national study regarding the foster care of children identified as human immunodeficiency virus-positive (HIV-positive) was conducted in 1991. A survey form was sent to the administrators of the State agency responsible for foster care in each Stat...
The U.S. population is fast evolving into a patchwork of health behaviors, incomes, and ethnic backgrounds. Simple cultural labeling will not do. A growing number of Americans, now numbering about 10 million, cannot or will not describe their race in...
The primary causes of mortality in the United States are noninfectious diseases and conditions. Epidemiologic and intervention activities related to most of these diseases and conditions have increased in most State health agencies over the past deca...
The authors performed a prenatal care needs assessment for Fresno County, CA, using data from a sample of 11,878 birth certificates for the county for 1989. Birth records, patterns of prenatal care utilization, and low birth weight outcomes in the co...
Marcus, S E; Emont, S L; Corcoran, R D; Giovino, G A; Pierce, J P; Waller, M N; Davis, R M;
Published Date:
1994 Jan-Feb
Source:
Public Health Rep. 109(1):125-134
Description:
The 1990 Smoking Activity Volunteer Executed Survey collected information on a wide range of policy-relevant issues concerning public attitudes about cigarette smoking. These issues include cigarette taxes, advertising restrictions, minors' access to...
An 18-month intervention was implemented to increase breast and cervical cancer screening among poor African-American women in Chicago. Breast and cervical cancer screening programs were set up in two public clinics, one community-based and the other...
EPIGRAM is a computer program designed to improve access to State-level underlying cause mortality data. The program produces results for population, deaths, death rate, age-adjusted death rate, years of potential life lost (YPLL), YPLL rate, and con...
Brink, S G; Gottlieb, N H; McLeroy, K R; Wisotzky, M; Burdine, J N;
Published Date:
1994 Jan-Feb
Source:
Public Health Rep. 109(1):135-142
Description:
The practice norms of community physicians and dentists in the Lehigh Valley of Pennsylvania for counseling about smoking cessation were surveyed. In addition, 1,373 residents in the valley were interviewed by telephone about the smoking counseling b...
In a Maine Area Health Education Center program some solutions were developed to the well-documented problem of health information material that cannot be read or comprehended by low literacy adults. Professionals in health education and adult educat...
Gordon, P R; Campos-Outcalt, D; Steele, L; Gonzales, C;
Published Date:
1994 Jan-Feb
Source:
Public Health Rep. 109(1):99-103
Description:
The Pascua-Yaqui Tribe of Arizona receives its health care services at a local neighborhood health center in Tucson and a satellite clinic located on the reservation. Using a computerized data base from the health center, the authors determined the u...
In this paper, the authors describe some of the complexities of collecting and presenting data on race and ethnicity based on the experiences of the Bureau of the Census. Different methods of data collection, different content and format of questions...
Race is an unscientific, societally constructed taxonomy that is based on an ideology that views some human population groups as inherently superior to others on the basis of external physical characteristics or geographic origin. The concept of race...
ContextDuring 1994–1997, approximately 70% and 60% of the cases of conditions reported to the National Notifiable Diseases Surveillance System included persons of known race and ethnicity, respectively. A major goal of the Healthy People 2020 initi...
Public health surveillance is the cornerstone of public health practice. The uses of surveillance include the identification of patterns of health among population subgroups. The assessment of race and ethnicity in public health surveillance is funda...
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (U.S.). United States. Health Resources and Services Administration. Community Risk Profile Work Group..
Published Date:
February 2004
Description:
The Integrated Guidelines for Developing Epidemiologic Profiles: HIV Prevention and Ryan White CARE Act Community Planning have been developed by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the Health Resources Services Administration to assis...
Hadler, James L.; Vugia, Duc J.; Bennett, Nancy M.; Moore, Matthew R.;
Published Date:
September 2015
Source:
Emerg Infect Dis. 21(9):1589-1594
Description:
The Emerging Infections Program (EIP), a collaboration between (currently) 10 state health departments, their academic center partners, and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, was established in 1995. The EIP performs active, population-b...