Social & Cultural Barriers to Access

Goal: To reduce social and cultural barriers to accessing health and health care for racial, ethnic and linguistic minorities in New Hampshire Investment to Date: $5,599,296 Number of grants to date: 138

Overview:

The Endowment for Health believes that all of New Hampshire's residents should have access to health and health care, regardless of their race, ethnicity, or the language they speak. Language and differences in cultural practices and beliefs present some of the greatest access barriers for patients as well as challenges for health care providers.

Overcoming these barriers, creating equal access and quality health care for all of New Hampshire's people is critical. This requires a commitment to strengthen our cross-cultural communication skills and improve social inclusion for all. It also requires us to understand and address the systemic influences on social and cultural barriers to health and employ strategies that remove these barriers.

Such strategies include the development of new models of culturally effective health care, diversification of the health workforce, empowerment of vulnerable populations, transformative dialogue, public policy advocacy and data collection.

Social & Cultural Barriers Theme Summary