scholarly journals Black African asylum seekers’ experiences of health care access in an eastern German state

2014 ◽  
Vol 10 (3) ◽  
pp. 134-147 ◽  
Author(s):  
Penelope Scott
Keyword(s):  
Health Care ◽  
Human Rights ◽  
Health Care Access ◽  
Asylum Seekers ◽  
Care Staff ◽  
Health Staff ◽  
German State ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Black African ◽  
Care Access

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to examine how access to health care for (rejected) asylum seekers in an eastern German state is structured and experienced and to consider the implications for their human rights. Design/methodology/approach – The paper is based on 12 in-depth interviews with rejected black African asylum seekers and also draws on ethnographic research undertaken at a grassroots refugee organisation and asylum homes. The analysis of the interview data are framed by theorisations of “everyday practices” as “tactics” of resistance to an imposed order. Findings – Accomplishing health care access involved a range of structural barriers and humiliating interactions with administrative and health care staff, which had adverse consequences for their health status and were injurious to their human rights and dignity. The study participants used a range of oppositional and discursive tactics in an effort to secure certain (health) outcomes, mediate social relations and resist their domination as asylum seekers. Research limitations/implications – Further research should focus on the cumulative micro-level effects of asylum policies on health care access and how they create health inequities and violate asylum seekers’ rights and dignity. Practical implications – Policy priorities should include the provision of human rights education as well as training and support for administrative and health staff. Originality/value – There is limited qualitative research on the health care experiences of asylum seekers in Germany. This paper makes policy recommendations and identifies areas for further research and human rights advocacy.

Human rights-based conceptions of deservingness: health and precarity

2020 ◽  
Vol 16 (3) ◽  
pp. 279-292
Author(s):  
Sarah Marshall
Keyword(s):  
Health Care ◽  
Human Rights ◽  
Health Care Providers ◽  
Health Care Access ◽  
Migrant Health ◽  
Dominant Negative ◽  
Care Providers ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Care Access ◽  
Health Related

Purpose Ideas of health-related deservingness in theory and practise have largely been attached to humanitarian notions of compassion and care for vulnerable persons, in contrast to rights-based approaches involving a moral-legal obligation to care based on universal citizenship principles. This paper aims to provide an alternative to these frames, seeking to explore ideas of a human rights-based deservingness framework to understand health care access and entitlement amongst precarious status persons in Canada. Design/methodology/approach Drawing from theoretical conceptualizations of deservingness, this paper aims to bring deservingness frameworks into the language of human rights discourses as these ideas relate to inequalities based on noncitizenship. Findings Deservingness frameworks have been used in public discourses to both perpetuate and diminish health-related inequalities around access and entitlement. Although, movements based on human rights have the potential to be co-opted and used to re-frame precarious status migrants as “undeserving”, movements driven by frames of human rights-based deservingness can subvert these dominant, negative discourses. Originality/value To date, deservingness theory has primarily been used to speak to issues relating to deservingness to welfare services. In relation to deservingness and precarious status migrants, much of the literature focuses on humanitarian notions of the “deserving” migrant. Health-related deservingness based on human rights has been under-theorized in the literature and the authors can learn from activist movements, precarious status migrants and health care providers that have taken on this approach to mobilize for rights based on being “human”.

Impact of restricting access to health care services on Syrian refugees in Jordan: evidence from cross-sectional surveys

2021 ◽  
Vol ahead-of-print (ahead-of-print) ◽  
Author(s):  
Ibraheem Khaled Abu Siam ◽  
María Rubio Gómez
Keyword(s):  
Health Care ◽  
Health Care Access ◽  
Access To Health Care ◽  
Health Care Services ◽  
Health Care Cost ◽  
Syrian Refugees ◽  
Cross Sectional ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Care Access ◽  
Care Services

Purpose Access to health-care services for refugees are always impacted by many factors and strongly associated with population profile, nature of crisis and capacities of hosing countries. Throughout refugee’s crisis, the Jordanian Government has adopted several healthcare access policies to meet the health needs of Syrian refugees while maintaining the stability of the health-care system. The adopted health-care provision policies ranged from enabling to restricting and from affordable to unaffordable. The purpose of this paper is to identify the influence of restricted level of access to essential health services among Syrian refugees in Jordan. Design/methodology/approach This paper used findings of a cross-sectional surveys conducted over urban Syrian refugees in Jordan in 2017 and 2018 over two different health-care access policies. The first were inclusive and affordable, whereas the other considered very restricting policy owing to high inflation in health-care cost. Access indicators from four main thematic areas were selected including maternal health, family planning, child health and monthly access of household. A comparison between both years’ access indicators was conducted to understand access barriers and its impact. Findings The comparison between findings of both surveys shows a sudden shift in health-care access and utilization behaviors with increased barriers level thus increased health vulnerabilities. Additionally, the finding during implementation of restricted access policy proves the tendency among some refugees groups to adopt negative adaptation strategies to reduce health-care cost. The participants shifted to use a fragmented health-care, reduced or delayed care seeking and use drugs irrationally weather by self-medication or reduce drug intake. Originality/value Understanding access barriers to health services and its negative short-term and long-term impact on refugees’ health status as well as the extended risks to the host communities will help states that hosting refugees building rational access policy to protect whole community and save public health gains during and post crisis. Additionally, it will support donors to better mobilize resources according to the needs while the humanitarian actors and service providers will better contribute to the public health stability during refugee’s crisis.

Social capital and health care access among the older adults in Bangladesh

2019 ◽  
Vol 23 (1) ◽  
pp. 54-63
Author(s):  
Md. Shahidul Islam
Keyword(s):  
Older Adults ◽  
Health Care ◽  
Social Capital ◽  
Logistic Regression ◽  
Older People ◽  
Health Care Access ◽  
Economic Hardship ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Care Access ◽  
Access Problem

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to investigate the association between social capital (SC) and health care access problem among the older people in Bangladesh. Design/methodology/approach This study applied a random sampling method to select 310 older adults (all aged 60 years) in Bangladesh. Exploratory factor analysis was employed to extract SC dimensions. Logistic regression was applied to measure the association of SC dimensions and access. Findings The logistic regression result shows that with a one-unit increase in social network, norms of reciprocity, and civic participation, health care access problem will be decreased by OR= 0.732 (95% CI =0.529–1.014); OR=0.641 (95% CI = 0.447–0.919); and OR=0.748 (95% CI = 0.556–1.006) units. Respondents who have economic hardship were 3.211 (OR=3.211, CI = 0.84–5.59) times more likely to say that they had health care access problem compared with who had no economic hardship. Research limitations/implications The study showed that the lower level of SC and presence of economic hardship increased the probability to health care access problem among the older people. Improving SC may be helpful in reducing health care access problem. However, economic hardship reductions are also important to reduce the health care access problem. Improving SC and reducing economic hardship thus should be implemented at the same time. Practical implications The study showed that low SC and economic hardship increased the probability to health care access problem. Improving SC may be helpful in reducing health inequity. However, economic hardship reductions also important to health care access. Therefore, improving SC and reducing economic hardship should be implemented at the same time. Originality/value This study has a great policy importance in regard to reducing health care access problem among the older adult in Bangladesh as SC has a potential to bring about a concomitant improvement in the condition of the health care access.

scholarly journals “I was trying to speak to their human side” coping responses of Belgium’s undocumented migrants to barriers in health-care access

2020 ◽  
Vol 16 (3) ◽  
pp. 253-267
Author(s):  
Dirk Lafaut ◽  
Gily Coene
Keyword(s):  
Health Care ◽  
Health Care Providers ◽  
Health Care Access ◽  
Access To Health Care ◽  
Undocumented Migrants ◽  
Care Providers ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Coping Responses ◽  
Care Access ◽  
Access To Health

Purpose Undocumented migrants experience major legal constraints in their health-care access. Little is known on how undocumented migrants cope with these limitations in health-care access as individuals. The purpose of this study is to explore the coping responses of undocumented migrants when they experience limited health-care access in face-to-face encounters with health-care providers. Design/methodology/approach The authors conducted multi-site ethnographic observations and 25 semi-structured in-depth interviews with undocumented migrants in Belgium. They combined the “candidacy model” of health-care access with models from coping literature on racism as a framework. The candidacy model allowed them to understand access to health care as a dynamic and interactive negotiation process between health-care workers and undocumented migrants. Findings Responses to impaired health-care access can be divided into four main strategies: (1) individuals can react with a self-protective response withdrawing from seeking further care; (2) they can get around the obstacle; (3) they can influence the health-care worker involved by deploying discursive or performative skills; or (4) they can seek to confront the source of the obstacle. Research limitations/implications These findings point to the importance of care relations and social networks, as well as discursive and performative skills of undocumented migrants when negotiating barriers in access to health care. Originality/value This study refines the candidacy model by highlighting how individuals respond on a micro-level to shifts towards exclusionary health policies and, by doing so dynamically, change provision of health-care services.

Stigma, Human Rights Violations, Health Care Access, and Disclosure among Men who have Sex with Men in the Gambia

2015 ◽  
Vol 7 (1) ◽  
pp. 139-152 ◽  
Author(s):  
K. Mason ◽  
S. Ketende ◽  
S. Peitzmeier ◽  
N. Ceesay ◽  
C. Logie ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Health Care ◽  
Human Rights ◽  
Health Care Access ◽  
The Gambia ◽  
Human Rights Violations ◽  
Care Access ◽  
Sex With Men

Health care access issues among young African American and Hispanic men

2020 ◽  
Vol ahead-of-print (ahead-of-print) ◽  
Author(s):  
LaTasha Johnson-Bibbs
Keyword(s):  
Health Care ◽  
African American ◽  
Health Care Access ◽  
Health Care Cost ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Descriptive Case Study ◽  
Care Access ◽  
Hispanic Men ◽  
The Individual

Purpose This paper aims to clarify the relationship between characteristics that contribute to health care access issues and individual behavior seeking health care. It proposes the different contexts of why African American and Hispanic men are not accessing health care. The study findings provided the target audience with past and present literature to contribute to the future resolution of racial and ethnic health care disparity, as well as health care access. Design/methodology/approach The paper opted for a descriptive case study using a one-on-one face-to-face semi-structured approach of a case study, including 10 depth interviews representing African American and Hispanic men who are experiencing health care access issues. The data were complemented by archival data analysis, description of personal accounts of the African American and Hispanic men and articles pertaining to racial and ethnic health disparities. Findings The paper provides insights into how change is brought about the improvement of health care for all races and ethnicity. It suggests that leaders act as “integrating forces” on two levels: integrating the important elements of improved health care coupled with communication, language and health care cost and mediating between the health care structures and the individual. Originality/value This paper fulfills an identified need to study the characteristics that contribute to health care access issues among African American and Hispanic men.

scholarly journals Could technology enable individuals with schizophrenia to access health care? The case of Ecuador

2021 ◽  
Vol ahead-of-print (ahead-of-print) ◽  
Author(s):  
Vivian Castro
Keyword(s):  
Health Care ◽  
Health Care Access ◽  
Access To Health Care ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Care Access ◽  
Use Of Technology ◽  
Access To Health ◽  
Smartphone Technology ◽  
Data Source ◽  
Use Of The Internet

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to fill in the gaps in the literature regarding health-care access for individuals with schizophrenia, with a focus on Ecuador, and how technology can enable health-care access during the pandemic. Design/methodology/approach To achieve this aim, the author reviewed peer-reviewed articles in English and Spanish (using, among other sources, Medline and ProQuest), the Ecuadorian Constitution, law projects on mental health and suicide and government reports. Findings The consensus seems to be that the Ecuadorian health-care system has failed in its constitutional mandate to provide essential care for mentally ill patients, such as those suffering from schizophrenia. The data supporting the use of the internet and smartphone technology for delivering health services during the pandemic are extremely clear, but substantive governmental responses have been lacking. Research limitations/implications The major limitation of this study is the lack of data on schizophrenia in Ecuador and the use of technology. Originality/value This evaluation of the current literature on the effect of the pandemic on access to health care for patients suffering from mental illness is much-needed and should provide a welcome data source for research, practice and policymaking.

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