Health Issues for Minority Adolescents

Adolescents are an underserved group in terms of health care. Poor and minority youth are particularly shortchanged in our current system. In view of the high incidence of many medical and psychological syndromes associated with poverty and discrimination, this situation is paradoxical. This book examines both common and unique health issues associated with a number of different groupsAfrican-American, Latino, Native American, Asian-American, and Hawaiianand explores the role of traditional and nontraditional treatments for each. The chapters represent a compendium of the most up-to-date studies summarized by leading researchers and include specific recommendations for improving health care services, which will prove valuable to providers and those concerned with public policy. The authors conclude that unless greater attention and resources are devoted to these youth, the consequences will continue to be dire, both for the groups involved and for society as a whole.

Marjorie Kagawa-Singer, a nurse and anthropologist, is an assistant professor in the School of Public Health and Asian American Studies Center at UCLA. She is the author of numerous articles concerning cross-cultural health care and multicultural issues in cancer care. Phyllis A. Katz is a clinical and developmental psychologist. She is the director of the Institute for Research on Social Problems, where she researches children’s gender-role development and racial attitude acquisition. She is coauthor of Big World, Small Screen: The Role of Television in American Society (Nebraska 1992). Dalmas Taylor, provost at the University of Texas at Arlington, is the author of Ethnicity and Bicultural Considerations in Psychology: Meeting the Needs of Ethnic Minorities. Judith Vanderryn is a psychologist at the Denver Veterans’ Affairs Medical Center, where she treats patients with severe post-traumatic stress disorder.