Jonathan M. Metzl, MD, PhD and Dorothy E. Roberts, JD
The call for structural competency encourages medicine to broaden its approach to matters of race and culture so that it might better address both individual-level doctor and patient characteristics and institutional factors.
A review of three journal articles shows the significant impact that poverty has on physical and mental health status, as well as all causes of mortality.
A case that illustrates how Western medicine's body or mind approach to diagnosis and treatment can differ from that of many patients from non-Western cultures.
Physicians need to understand that a patient's faith shapes his or her understanding of illness and know how to respond when the patient attempts to evangelize during the clinical encounter.
Physicians need to understand that a patient's faith shapes his or her understanding of illness and know how to respond when the patient attempts to evangelize during the clinical encounter.
Physicians need to understand that a patient's faith shapes his or her understanding of illness and know how to respond when the patient attempts to evangelize during the clinical encounter.
When serving an ethnically diverse population, it is imperative that physicians have an understanding of a patients' cultural background and attitudes towards health, nutrition and personal care.