Diversity in Healthcare Demographics

Diversity in Healthcare Demographics Author’s Name Institutional Affiliation Diversity in Healthcare Introduction A country like the USA has an extremely diverse population. This makes it difficult to provide common healthcare facilities to everyone. Being an extremely homogenous field can be problematic as healthcare barriers go beyond language barriers. When doctors are exposed to such diverse groups, there is a chance that patient care can suffer immeasurably (St. George’s University, 2018). Differences in health have varying effects on population sections. Medical practitioners must provide patient-oriented care that recognizes these distinctions and acknowledges them. Absence of medical-diversity is troubling for patients seeking doctors who know their particular requirements. Therefore, diversity in Healthcare needs to be observed across, gender, age, culture, spirituality and socioeconomic status. Discussion Diversity Diversity in Healthcare is an important subject of interest as the world is slowly evolving to become a more acceptable place for different groups of people. Over the years there has been a considerable change in gender types, sexual orientations and ethnic groups. Diverse Demographics and its Impact on Healthcare Industry Walters (2017) states that changing demographics require that healthcare also makes considerable changes. These demographic shifts pressurize the industry to form reforms in their services. According to the United Nations, by 2025, there will be a considerable increase in population. Taking population as an example, we can expect that this increase in number will require healthcare services to find resources which will deliver long-term care and chronic disease management. The Brooking Institute (Kharas, 2017) states that by 2030, about 65% of the population shall be middle class. Increase in urbanization is leading people to have a sedentary lifestyle, which will eventually lead to an increase in obesity, diabetes and other heart-related diseases. According to Kimmel et al (2016), the National Hospice and Palliative Care Organization states that about 87% of the population were Caucasians for Medicare. Followed by 8% African-American, about 2% for Hispanics and 1% for Asians. About 0.1 were local Americans. Minorities spend too much on Medicare and Medicaid which do not provide services when facing acute health problems like cancer (Hospice News, 2019). If a country has diverse demography, healthcare needs to be customized across the following area: 1 Culture: In some cultures, is not acceptable for a female to see a male physician. While other cultures have medicines that are appropriate to them for a particular disease (Valesco-Mondragon, 2016). 2 Gender: In a study done by Socias, Koehoorn and Shoveller (2016), the effect of gender on perceived healthcare needs was researched. The results from the study showed that women in comparison to men had the highest unmet perceived healthcare needs. This suggested that there are interventions required to meet healthcare equality for all residents of British-Columbia. 3 Religion-Spirituality: It is expected that healthcare providers also meet the needs of their patients keeping in mind their religion. For example; Buddhists place emp...