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Understanding Barriers to Care for Refugee Patients: Lessons From Focus Groups
Joanna Balza1, Savitri Tsering2, Julia Dickson-Gomez3
1Medical College of Wisconsin, Milwaukee, Wisconsin, jbalza@mcw.edu.
Background:
Refugee populations resettled in the United States face health disparities and barriers to accessing care. Better understanding of the barriers this population faces may help clinicians address them.
Methods:
Focus groups with refugees were held in Wisconsin. Discussion prompts such as "What could be done to improve health in your community?" were used. Notes from the focus groups were organized and coded using MAXQDA.
Results:
Six themes were identified from the focus groups regarding health care barriers and experiences: language, interpretation, pharmacy, insurance, transportation, and respect.
Discussion:
Clinicians working with refugee populations can strive to minimize barriers to care for refugee patients by being aware of the barriers, implementing changes in their practice, and/or community advocacy.
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