Acculturation, Hispanic ethnicity, and trust: Verifying and explaining racial/ethnic differences in trust in health providers in North Carolina Medicaid

What is it about?

Repeated surveys of North Carolina Medicaid enrollees showed that while Whites had high trust-in-health provider with Blacks expressing only slightly lower trust (typically within the margin of error), Hispanic respondents (~ 1/3 of those surveyed), showed much lower trust-in-provider. The discussion section provides a possible explanation for this anomaly based on levels of acculturation.

Featured Image

Why is it important?

An increasing Hispanic population in the U.S. means that a measurable absence of trust in health providers will constitute a substantial problem in providing health care to significant numbers of people. If part of the explanation is found in low levels of acculturation to the dominant U.S. society & culture and, more specifically, to the way medicine and health is provided, then with greater experience and succeeding generations, the gap is likely to be decreased.