The trend may suggest that minorities in these neighborhoods are receiving sporadic “crisis” care rather than regular mental health care. Blacks and Hispanics who live in low-poverty areas are also more likely to be referred to public mental health services by police or social services personnel rather than family or friends, as is the case for white residents.
“Minorities in low-poverty areas may stand out as more ‘attention-worthy’ than others — more visible — such that their deviant behaviors are readily recognized and constrained,” suggest Julian Chun-Chung Chow, Ph.D., of the University of California, Berkeley, and colleagues.
The research, published in the American Journal of Public Health, is one of the first studies conducted outside of California that compares mental health services use by minorities living at different poverty levels, the researchers say.
Chow and colleagues compared public mental health services use among 33,278 white, 23,683 black, 19,849 Hispanic and 1,275 Asian patients in low- and high-poverty areas in New York. In their study, low-poverty areas were defined as zip code regions where fewer than 20 percent of households were below the poverty level. High-poverty areas were those in which 20 percent or more of the households were living above the poverty level.
Minority mental health service users were more likely than white users to live in high-poverty areas. Twenty-seven percent of Asian patients, 49 percent of black patients and 61 percent of Hispanic patients lived in these poorer neighborhoods, compared with 15 percent of their white counterparts.
Compared to the overall population in low-poverty neighborhoods, a disproportionately high number of black and Hispanic residents in low-poverty areas used public mental health services, the researchers found. The number of white and Asian patients using the public services in low-poverty areas was lower than expected.
Chow and colleagues’ findings also suggest that youth are important users of public mental health services. They note that 25 percent of black and Hispanic public services patients, along 10 percent of white and Asian patients, were 18 years old or younger. These percentages were the same in both low- and high-poverty neighborhoods.
The study was supported by the National Institute of Aging.
By Becky Ham, Staff Writer
Health Behavior News Service
FOR MORE INFORMATION
Health Behavior News Service: (202) 387-2829 or www.hbns.org.
Interviews: Contact Julian Chun-Chung Chow at (510) 643-9288 or jchow99@uclink4.berkeley.edu.
American Journal of Public Health: (202) 777-2511 or www.ajph.org.
Journal
American Journal of Public Health