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Why Collect Race, Ethnicity, and Primary Language
Numerous studies document that racial and ethnic minorities often receive lower quality care than non-minorities. Although much information on health care comes from health care organizations, data on race, ethnicity, and primary language are often unavailable or incomplete.
In addition, deaf and hard of hearing populations face challenges in accessing high-quality health care. According to the National Institute on Deafness and Other Communication Disorders report, "Statistics about Hearing Disorders, Ear Infections, and Deafness" (2007), approximately 28 million Americans have hearing loss.
Valid and reliable data are fundamental building blocks for identifying differences in care and developing targeted interventions to improve the quality of care delivered to specific populations The capacity to measure and monitor quality of care for various racial, ethnic, and linguistic populations rests on the ability both to measure quality of care in general and to conduct similar measurements across different racial, ethnic, and linguistic groups. This section provides information about why your health care organization should collect these data.
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