Characterizing the relationship between medical mistrust, health behaviors and neighborhood level factors in African American cancer survivors.

Wayne State University, Detroit MI

Investigators

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Abstract

Project Summary African Americans experience an unequal cancer burden, with the highest incidence and mortality rates for most cancer types. For African American cancer survivors, this burden continues posttreatment as evidenced by reports of poor related quality of life scores. Medical mistrust, the belief that healthcare providers, institutions and systems at large do not have an individual’s best interests in mind, is an understudied potential cause of cancer health disparities. When considering the impact of medical mistrust, it is even more important to consider group-based medical mistrust, which includes both an interpersonal and vicarious examination of healthcare experiences to further tease out the nuance of this phenomenon. The proposed diversity supplement aims to characterize the relationship between medical mistrust, survivorship outcomes, in the context of neighborhood level factors to better understand the experiences of African American cancer survivors. We will investigate the relationship between health behaviors and survivorship outcomes. After which we will investigate whether the neighborhood level factors mediate the relationship between medical mistrust and survivorship outcomes, or medical mistrust is moderated by neighborhood level factors. Finally, we will host several focus groups with past participants using member checking to allow participants the opportunity to offer feedback and commentary on the medical mistrust results.