Pain Management For Chinese Immigrants Suffering From Cancer and Other Illnesses
Pain is pain is pain. Right. Wrong, if you are referring to pain among Chinese immigrants suffering from cancer and other debilitating physical illnesses. An article appearing in the Winter 2008 edition of The Pain Practitioner, by Lara Dhingra, PhD., reveals some upsetting yet important information for health professionals and the public at large to understand. In this land of opportunity and free will, this population is often restricted by their own cultural, psychological and family-related beliefs as well as attitudes imposed upon them due to their sociodemographic status.
"Chinese immigrants diagnosed with cancer are at high risk for pain and symptom burden." Studies show that this population of Americans present many barriers to receiving adequate treatment and pain control. "Among elderly ethnic Chinese adults, barriers to care may include low English proficiency...; limited education, and poverty...." Many of them "suffer in isolation and may underreport pain due to specific cultural barriers...fears that their pain will be perceived as a burden to their family members and deeply-rooted values and beliefs of stoicism and fatalism which inhibit pain expression, particularly for men."
Chinese culture believes in Buddhism and Confucian philosophy which teaches them, especially men, to be stoic. Revealing and admitting to pain publicly is a sign of weakness and humiliation. Even the diagnosis of cancer is associated with shame. "In traditional Buddhist and Confucian belief: To live with pain, is to see and understand the world as it really is." Chinese patients tend to prefer their own Traditional Chinese Medicine and other complementary and alternative treatments such as herbal remedies, acupuncture and Chinese massage. These patients often believe that pain indicates that the disease has progressed and may refuse to take medication to suppress the pain.
Chinese cancer patients, unable to freely talk about their illness and pain, may also suffer from severe stress, which can increase pain and interfere with control of symptoms. They also may not seek medical help until they have reached an advanced stage of their illness. As the largest Asian subgroup in American (3.6 million people), about 50% of them "are medically underserved, poorly acculturated, and economically disadvantaged." Preliminary results of a current 2 year study of patients in Chinatown, Manhattan, NYC, indicates that the highly effective pain medications available are not being adequately given to this minority population.
Solutions are simple but not easy. There is a need for "comprehensive and systematic assessment of pain and symptoms in ethnic Chinese cancer patients" as well as "a need to identify barriers and facilitators to effective pain and symptom care." Perhaps these is also a need to provide easier access to Traditional Chinese Medicine and other CAM treatments as a segway or addition to our current allopathic medical treatments (surgery and pharmaceuticals).
Bestbuy Efile Free Tax Return Bestbuy Body Weight Scale Bestbuy Hde Store Lowest Price
