Health Disparities In Underserved Communities: Its Impact And Potential Solutions

Health Disparities have these properties to negatively impact various subsets of the population as it has systematically experienced multiple layers of socio-economic obstacles to health. It should always be remembered that health care providers should work collaboratively to attain certain goals to mitigate gaps that existed between healthcare. According to experts, internal professional collaboration is needed for healthcare providers to support patients and minimize the existing health disparities in public health (Vanderbilt, Dail, & Jaberi, 2015). If we take into account United States, then we can find that the health population marks an uneven continuum, ranging from healthy to unhealthy dimensions. It should be noted that the healthcare system widely relies on factors like income, race, and geographical location. Based on the report, it can be stated that research policy and public health practice subsequently rely on disparities like life expectancy, risk factors, morbidity, quality of life in various sections of the population. Obstacles that are linked with religion, socio-economic status, mental health, sex, geographic orientation, sexual orientation hinder health disparities even more. There are shreds of evidence that the United States is highly plagued with inadequate interprofessional collaborations and comprehensive teamwork and this pointed out towards inequality existed in healthcare. Health Disparities are a living truth among underserved communities and it can be mostly witnessed in the health sector of the United States and thus it is impossible for any health care professional to handle this impending national crisis alone (Vanderbilt, Dail, & Jaberi, 2015).

Healthcare disparities are not new and it creates inequalities in multiple layers of our society. These disparities are often visioned through the lens of race, ethnicity, gender, age, and other social factors. Historically, underserved groups have had greater rates of chronic disease, early death, and other metrics of well-being. Reduced medical care resources and demand are also noticeable, ranging from emergency treatment of acute diseases to routine check-ups to suggested screenings and therapies (Reducing Health Disparities in Underserved Populations, 2021). It should be noted that healthcare educators share the social responsibility to teach medical students about social determinants of health and health-care disparities and subsequently to encourage medical students to pursue residencies in primary care and medical practice in underserved communities. It has been estimated that over 57 million individuals reside in nearly 5,864 designated primary care shortage areas in the United States and experience negative treatment from healthcare. For instance, a shortage of primary care physicians in four primary care specialties in these urban and rural communities: general or family practice general internal medicine, pediatrics, and obstetrics and gynecology. Thus, experts confirmed that the United States tends to face an acute shortage of primary care physicians which leads to a further reduction in accessing primary care services for medically underserved individuals or communities (VanderWielen, Vanderbilt, & Steven H. Crossman, 2015).

Healthcare professional students care for these underserved communities and try to take social responsibilities to undermine the issues rising from healthcare sectors. They are so much inclined because during their education and training, they are highly exposed to underserved populations and thus, they have the urge to take into account certain social determinants of health. There is a need to encourage the students to pursue primary care in the healthcare sector and give training opportunities to them so that they can efficiently serve healthcare in underserved communities (VanderWielen, Vanderbilt, & Steven H. Crossman, 2015).