Minority Doctors Report Problems

Black and Hispanic doctors across the United States report having greater difficulties than white doctors in obtaining health care for their patients, according to a study published in the online journal Medscape General Medicine. The report, which included 12,300 responses from doctors in 60 communities, found that about 12 percent of black doctors and nearly 15 percent of Hispanic doctors said they had a hard time getting specialty referrals, while about 8 percent of white doctors had that problem. Although blacks and Hispanics make up about 24 percent of the US population, they represent only 10 percent of the doctors surveyed, while white doctors accounted for 76 percent of the group. About 36 percent of black doctors and 32 percent of Hispanic doctors said they could not get their patients into hospitals when necessary. White doctors reported a 24 percent incidence rate of the same problem. Lee Hargraves of the Center for Studying Health System Change was the study's designer and lead author.

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