Why we study disparities : the human stories behind the data / Jeffrey Brady

"LAST YEAR marked the 30th anniversary of the Report of the Secretary's Task Force on Black and Minority Health.1 This report, known as the Heckler Report (for Margaret M. Heckler, then the secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services [HHS]), documented persistent health disparities that accounted for 60 000 excess deaths each year. For the first time, the federal government acknowledged that eliminating health disparities should be a national priority. "There [is] a continuing disparity in the burden of death and illness experienced by Blacks and other minority Americans as compared with our nation's population as a whole," Secretary Heckler wrote in that report. "Although our health charts do itemize steady gains in the health status of minority Americans, the stubborn disparity remain[s]-an affront both to our ideals and to the ongoing genius of American medicine." Yet, health disparities-differences in health outcomes between populations2-continue to vex the US health care system.3 These disparities can be based on race, gender, insurance status, and other factors. Many likely result from a combination of economic and cultural factors. They are confounding and deeply frustrating to health care providers, because they persist despite focused attention on making high-quality care available to all. The National Healthcare Quality and Disparities Report, or QDR, documents and quantifies these disparities. Mandated by Congress and published annually by the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ) since 2003, the QDR is the gold standard for measuring national progress in achieving quality goals. The integration of disparities data into the quality report demonstrates our recognition that quality improvement is incomplete until everyone enjoys its benefits. Unfortunately, these data show that some of the inequities the Heckler Report described in 1985 still persist."

Nursing