People from ethnic minorities seeking help for Long Covid: a qualitative study 2024 Smyth, Chew-Graham et al

Background: People from ethnic minority groups are disproportionately affected by COVID-19, are less likely to access primary healthcare and report dissatisfaction with healthcare. Whilst the prevalence of Long Covid in ethnic minority groups is unclear, these groups are under-represented in Long Covid specialist clinics and Long Covid lived experience research which informed the original Long Covid healthcare guidelines.

Aim: To understand lived experiences of Long Covid in people from ethnic minority groups.

Design & setting: Qualitative study with people living with Long Covid in the UK. Method: Semi-structured interviews with people who self-disclosed Long Covid were conducted (between June 2022 and June 2023) via telephone or video call. Thematic analysis was conducted. People living with Long Covid or caring for someone with Long Covid advised on all stages of the research.

Results: Interviews were conducted with 31 participants representing diverse socio-economic demographics. Help-seeking barriers included little awareness of Long Covid or available support and not feeling worthy of receiving care. Negative healthcare encounters were reported in primary healthcare; however, these services were crucial for accessing secondary or specialist care. There were further access difficulties and dissatisfaction with specialist care. Experiences of stigma and discrimination contributed to delays in seeking healthcare and unsatisfactory experiences, resulting in feelings of mistrust in healthcare.

Conclusion: Experiences of stigma and discrimination resulted in negative healthcare experiences and mistrust in healthcare, creating barriers to help-seeking. Empathy, validation of experiences, and fairness in recognition and support of healthcare needs are required to restore trust in healthcare.

Open access, https://bjgp.org/content/early/2024/05/17/BJGP.2023.0631

 

The irony of Chew-Graham publishing something that includes, "Empathy, validation of experiences, and fairness in recognition and support of healthcare needs are required to restore trust in healthcare." shouldn't be lost.

 

It's pretty much a biopsychosocial classic at this point. So many papers from the usual gang and others talk about it that it has to be some sort of exercise they go through to justify themselves.

It's hard to believe that anyone can be this clueless, but there have been a few recent papers from FND fanatics examining this stigma, the product of their work, which feels very much like the classic "criminal returning to the scene of the crime" so I imagine it's some sort of future protective mechanism, where once they're exposed they'll point out at how compassionate they were. Or whatever.

Hubris is one hell of a drug.

 

Benevolent paternalism. But worse, a new more vicious in consequence and slimy pretend it’s because we care turned up to ten so supporters ‘gave over their sick’ to them