Racial/Ethnic Diversity: Research

Diversity in the Health Professions Matters: The Untold Story of Meharry Medical College
Wayne J. Riley, MD, Journal of Health Care for the Poor and Underserved, May 2008.
"Meharry Medical College has a 130-year plus history and track record of diversifying the health professions. It is focused on addressing health care disparities in the form of its research initiatives, patient care of the underserved, and unique nurturing educational environment." Read More...

African American Physicians and Organized Medicine, 1846-1968: Origins of Racial Divide
Robert B. Baker, PhD et al., Journal of the American Medical Association, July 16, 2008
"Like the nation as a whole, organized medicine in the United States carries a legacy of racial bias and segregation that should be understood and acknowledged. For more than 100 years, many state and local medical societies openly discriminated against black physicians, barring them from membership and from professional support and advancement." Read More...

Minority Faculty Voices on Diversity in Academic Medicine: Perspectives From One School
Megan R. Mahoney, MD et al., Academic Medicine, August 2008
"As racial and ethnic diversity in the general population of the United States increases, research continues to show that diversity in the physician workforce improves health care quality and access to care for ethnic minorities. In 2004, three ethnic minority groups, African Americans, Latino Americans, and American Indians, represented more than 25% of the U.S. population but only 6% of the nation's physicians." Read More...

Student Body Racial and Ethnic Composition and Diversity-Related Outcomes in US Medical Schools
Somnath Saha, MD, MPH et al., Journal of the American Medical Association, September 10, 2008
"Most medical schools in the United States explicitly seek to engender diversity within their student bodies. Because of the rapidly increasing racial and ethnic diversity of the US population, and the commitment to eliminating well-documented racial disparities in health care quality and outcomes, academic leaders advocate for a more 'culturally competent' physician workforce and claim that racially and ethnically diverse student bodies are essential to that goal." Read More...

Diversifying the Medical Classroom - Is More Evidence Needed?
Olveen Carrasquillo, MD, MPH and Elizabeth T. Lee-Rey, MD, MPH, Journal of the American Medical Association, September 10, 2008
"Despite 30 years of public and private initiatives to increase physician diversity, the proportion of medical school graduates who are from underrepresented minority (URM) groups has stubbornly remained in the 10% to 15% range. This is at a time when the United States has become more racially and ethnically diverse, with current minorities projected to comprise 54% of the population by 2050." Read More...

Medical Students' Perspectives on a Multicultural Curriculum
Monica L. Lypson, MD et al., Journal of the National Medical Association, September 2008
"The Liaison Committee on Medical Education requires medical schools to deliver curriculum that prepares graduates to care for a culturally diverse patient population. This study explores student perceptions of 1 multicultural curriculum and their preparedness for dealing with: racism, stereotypes, community partnership and disparities." Read More...

Pipeline Programs in the Health Professions, Part 1: Preserving Diversity and Reducing Health Disparities
Journal of the National Medical Association, September 2009
"Racial and ethnic minorities are underrepresented in the health professions. Affirmative action and educational pipeline programs play a vital role in increasing the diversity of health professions, addressing educational opportunity gaps, and reducing health disparities. Part 1 of this 2-part series discusses the need for educational pipeline programs to assist underrepresented minorities (URMs) in entering the health professions and the importance of these programs in developing a cadre of diverse providers to reduce health care inequality." Read More…

Disparities in Human Resources: Addressing the Lack of Diversity in the Health Professions
Kevin Grumbach and Rosalia Mendoza, Health Affairs, March/April 2008.
"Despite daunting disparities in primary education, interventions in the educational pipeline can pay off for increasing minority entrants into the health professions." Read More...

Career Experiences and Perceptions of Underrepresented Minority School School Faculty
Deborah L. Wingard, PhD et al., Journal of the National Medical Assocation, September 2008
"Although studies have outlined the benefit of diversity in academic medicine, the number of underrepresented minority (URM ) faculty remains low. In 1998, University of California,San Diego (UCSD) School of Medicine with the Hispanic Center of Excellence began a formalized proactive faculty development program." Read More...

How Leaky is the Health Career Pipeline? Minority Student Achievement in College Gateway Courses
Charles Alexander, PhD, Eric Chen, MPH and Kevin Grumbach, MD. Academic Medicine, June 2009
"Increasing the enrollment of underrepresented minorities (URMs) in the health professions is a challenging and urgent issue. Six percent of nurses, 9% of physicians, and 5% of dentists are of black, Hispanic, or American Indian background, yet these ethnic groups collectively represent one-quarter of the U.S. population. The proportion of URM students in matriculating classes in U.S. medical and dental schools showed no net gain between 1995 and 2005, failing to keep up with the growth in minority populations." Read More…

Race-Neutral Versus Race-Conscious Workforce Policy to Improve Access to Care
Somnath Saha and Scott A. Shipman, Health Affairs, January/February 2008
"Using racial preferences for admitting minority-group applicants to medical schools - a "hot button" issue - would be a sure way to improve access to care for underserved Americans." Read More...

American Medical Association Apologizes for Racism in Medicine
Yele Aluko, MD, FACC, FSCAI, Journal of the National Medical Association, October 2008
"On July 10, 2008, a seminal event silently occurred. The American Medical Association (AMA) took an unprecedented public position in the history of American medicine by officially apologizing to African-American physicians for enabling decades of racial discriminatory practices against them. The impact of this event needs broader exposure, and the relevance to our local community of the history mentioned needs better understanding." Read More...

Mount Sinai Journal of Medicine Special Focus on Diversity in Academic Medicine
Mount Sinai Journal of Medicine, December 2008
"The rationale for increasing diversity in medicine has been supported by increasingly strong evidence. Benefits to the medical educational environment, advances in research for minority populations, improved access to healthcare, and improve patient satisfaction,articularly for diverse populations, have been documented in the published literature. Nevertheless, despite nearly 50 years of targeted programs and advocacy, the representation of students and faculty from underrepresented minority (URM) groups in US medical schools remains disturbingly inadequate. Currently, only about 14% of medical students and 7% of faculty in US medical schools are from URM groups." Read More...

Improving the Diversity Climate in Academic Medicine: Faculty Perceptions as a Catalyst for Institutional Change
Academic Medicine, January 2009
"Increasing the diversity of the physician workforce has gained national attention as one of many potential solutions to problems of racial and social class disparities in access to health care. Ethnic minority physicians are more likely to practice in underserved areas and to care for patients of their own race/ethnic group, as well as low-income patients, Medicaid-insured and uninsured patients, and patients with poorer health status. Ethnic minority patients have been shown to experience higher levels of participation and satisfaction with ethnic minority physicians. Thus, a more diverse health care workforce could enhance the health care experiences of ethnic minority patients." Read More…

Supports and Obstacles in the Medical School Application Process for American Indians and Alaska Natives
Journal of Health Care for the Poor and Underserved - May 2009
"Reviews of the evidence on health professions workforce diversity point to several potential strategies to increase the numbers of minorities from underrepresented groups, including AI/ANs. These strategies encompass interventions early in the educational pipeline (e.g., general student academic preparation), to later-stage interventions targeted at both individuals (e.g., career awareness and academic preparation specific to a given health profession) and health professions schools (e.g., admissions policies and institutional climate). Grumbach and colleagues argue that targeting resources at later stages of the pipeline may be the most cost-effective means of increasing the number of underrepresented minority physicians." Read More…

Does the Under- or Overrepresentation of Minority Physicians across Geographical Areas Affect the Location Decisions of Minority Physicians?
August 2009 – Health Services Research
"Racial diversity has recently been the topic of reports by the Sullivan Commission on Diversity in the Healthcare Workforce and the Institute of Medicine (Institute of Medicine 2004; Sullivan Commission 2004). These reports emphasize the importance of racial/ethnic physician–patient concordance in the provision of quality patient care." Read More..

Historically Black Medical Schools: Addressing the Minority Health Professional Pipeline and the Public Mission of Care For Vulnerable Populations
Journal of the National Medical Association, September 2009
"Since the actionable determinants of health such as personal beliefs and behaviors, socioeconomic factors, and the environment disproportionately affect the poor (and often racial/ethnic minorities), many have suggested that focusing efforts on this population will both directly and indirectly improve the overall health of the nation. Key to the success of such strategies are the ongoing efforts by historically black medical schools (HBMSs) as well as other minority serving medical and health professional schools, who produce a disproportionate percentage of the high-quality and diverse health professionals that are dedicated to maintaining the health of an increasingly diverse nation." Read More…

The Joint Admission Medical Program: A Statewide Approach to Expanding Medical Education and Career Opportunities for Disadvantaged Students
Bernell Dalley, PhD et al., Academic Medicine, October 2009
"The authors provide a brief history of JAMP, describe its structure and operation, summarize objective performance data, and identify some of the challenges still faced. These include increasing the participation of students from underrepresented minority groups within the legal structure for the program, and fostering substantive participation in JAMP by all of Texas' undergraduate institutions." Read More…

Pipeline Programs in the Health Professions, Part 1: Preserving Diversity and Reducing Health Disparities
September 2009 – Journal of the National Medical Association
"Racial and ethnic minorities are underrepresented in the health professions. Affirmative action and educational pipeline programs play a vital role in increasing the diversity of health professions, addressing educational opportunity gaps, and reducing health disparities. Part 1 of this 2-part series discusses the need for educational pipeline programs to assist underrepresented minorities (URMs) in entering the health professions and the importance of these programs in developing a cadre of diverse providers to reduce health care inequality." Read More…

Underrepresentation of Underrepresented Minorities in Academic Medicine: The Need to Enhance the Pipeline and the Pipe
January 2010 - Gastroenterology
"The number of underrepresented minorities (URMs; black or African American, Hispanic or Latino, American Indian or Alaska Native, Native Hawaiian or other Pacific Islander) among US medical school faculty is markedly low when compared with their respective percent representation of the US population." Read More…

The State of Diversity in the Health Professions A Century After Flexner
February 2010 – Academic Medicine
"Although the 1910 Flexner Report recommended the closure of a large number of operating medical schools, its impact was disproportionately felt on minority schools. The report's recommendations resulted in the closure of five out of seven predominantly black medical schools. Also noteworthy about the report was Flexner's utilitarian argument that black physicians should serve as sanitarians and hygienists for black communities in villages and plantations." Read More…

The Educational Pipeline for Health Care Professionals: Understanding the Source of Racial Differences
Winter 2010 – Journal of Human Resources
"The underrepresentation of blacks in the healthcare professions may have direct implications for the health outcomes of minority patients, underscoring the importance of understanding movement through the educational pipeline into professional healthcare careers by race. Our results emphasize the importance of pre-collegiate factors and of jointly examining the full chain of educational decisions in understanding the sources of racial disparities in professional healthcare occupations." Read More…

Medical Education Futures Study

George Washington University School of Public Health and Health Services

Josiah Macy Jr. Foundation

Racial/Ethnic Diversity: Research