What Are The Benefits Of Acupuncture Treatment For African Americans With Essential Hypertension Harvard Case Solution & Analysis

What Are The Benefits Of Acupuncture Treatment For African Americans With Essential Hypertension Case Solution

Chapter 2

Literature Review

Introduction

Different studies are examined regarding high blood pressure, hypertension and racism with African American, which have resulted in racism being the main element which directly leads to the people having low self-esteem and becoming the reason for them to have high blood pressure. The socio-economic status contributes in the relationship of hypertension and the high blood pressure. The lower social status initiates in lower self-esteem and the life expectancy gets lower because of this factor. Racism is also the major part of this issue because the African Americans face racial discrimination by the White Americans.There are many studies that are conducted on the positive effects of acupuncture over reducing hypertension, stress and PTSD. There are also many studies that show the positive negative impact which racism has over the body, so utilization of acupuncture for treating hypertension among the African American community and reducing their rate of cardiovascular disease, kidney disease, and strokes, can prove to be the best option.

Another study found that the result of high blood pressure is also related with the high level of anger and passive aggressiveness where the people do not express their anger and suppress their feelings, which results in the causes of hypertension and negative blood pressure. (Steffen, 2003)

Knowledge, belief and socio-economic are the attributes of hypertension and disturbed blood pressure. The lower level of education and the living standard are the key factors. Different studies analyze that less awareness of hypertension among the people belonging to African American race keeps them unaware of the fact that they might have hypertension even after having visible symptoms.

2.1 African Americans

Racism is increasing in the United States, which is creating problem in the country. This is a topic, which is massively discussed in the United States, and scholars are working on these topics. Throughout the time, it is been concluded that the racism is decreasing in the United States, but in reality it still exists to a significant extent. According to the statistics of United States; the racial attitude has increased  from 1940 to 1997. The reason behind why African Americans are under stress, is racism (systemic, internalized, discrimination, micro aggression etc.) that exists in the United States. Being in a constant state of freight, African Americans experience the cascade of chemical and physical effects of the autonomic nervous system.

African Americans are often thought to be lazy, undisciplined and having poor diets, which is the most common narrative espoused by the medical industry to define why the rate of hypertension is so high in the African American community s, but the study shows that the factors mentioned by the medical industry are still less likely to cause hypertension among African Americans than racism which the experience in the US. Many of the studies that look at the diet of African Americans in the US, don’t provide data on white people in the same area/socioeconomic who consume the same diet. The other factor is that when African Americans are placed on a pharmaceutical protocol for hypertension; it is usually a not a mono therapy. More often than not, African Americans are placed on a cocktail of two or more drugs that include a hydrochloride as well as harsher pharmaceutical that have intense side effects. Most of the pharmaceutical research is done on college going white males often do not have the same efficacy when used on African Americans. African Americans aged 18-49 are 2 times more likely to die from heart diseases than whites.

Hypertension prevalence was higher among non-Hispanic black (40.3%) than non-Hispanic white (27.8%), non-Hispanic Asian (25.0%), or Hispanic (27.8%) adults.

According to the CDC, African-Americans experience the disease of hypertension at a higher rate than that of their White, Asian, West African and Caribbean peers. Many reports cite a genetic predisposition of this disease by African-Americans. However, studies also show that African-Americans are genetically similar to their West African and Caribbean counterparts in particular.However hypertension does not exist in these communities at the same extent as it does in African Americans. (Need a citation here).

The evidence for the existence of genetic susceptibility variants for the common form of hypertension ("essential hypertension") remains weaker and inconsistent. This leads many researchers to believe that the hypertension among African-Americans may not simply be a matter of a genetic predisposition. It is important to note that African-Americans who are similarly situated in terms of weight, diet and exercise as their counterparts from other racial/cultural groups, still continue to experience greater rates of hypertension.

Compounding this issue is the fact that doctors often prescribe intense medication to the patients, which might not be much helpful in treating the hypertension and offset the African Americans. The intensity of such medicines can cause severe impact on the patients’ heath rather than being effective in managing hypertension given the absence of remedies focused on root causes and therapies that work directly to eliminate those root causes.

Race/ethnicity and socioeconomic status (SES) are social categories that capture different exposure to conditions of life that have health consequences. Although SES is an important factor in the overall health of African-Americans and other social determinants of health may also prove to be equally important. Researchers suggest that  African Americans confront racial issueson daily basis which often trigger psychosocial stressors in the United States and it might be the underlying factor for their high levels of hypertension and morbidity.

Although acupuncture is widely known for pain management, but it has been increasingly used as a practice that  to provides overall wellness and acts as a stress manager. If we consider the root cause of hypertension in African-Americans as being tied to their psycho-social experiences, then it is most likely for them to have benefits from acupuncture in order to have their stress managed

2.2 Hypertension

Hypertension is found in approximately 50% of the African American population. The past studies define that hypertension can occur because of biological factors and genetically attributes. Different theories explained the high level of hypertension in them. (Wilson, 1991). The international studies found that the hypertension is normally faced by the African Americans in social and cultural aspect. The study also explains that race is the most important element because of which they are differentiated and treated unequally as compared to any biological aspect.

African Americans are the people who have high cultural values and they share strong bonds with each other. They experience the same maltreatment's on the basis of their social and cultural values, which give hype to their high level of stress. Sleep time control is one of the proper method of treating hypertension........................

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