It is well documented that there are large disparities in health outcomes between older minority women and older white women. Barriers to optimal health care for older minority women are many, and include poor communication and cross-cultural misunderstandings between them and their care providers. Yet research on older minority women's views of the provider-patient interaction is virtually non-existent. Their beliefs about factors that lead to satisfactory provider-patient interactions j are poorly understood, including their beliefs about the benefits of assertiveness. It is also not known how these beliefs might be linked to cultural factors. The proposed study will examine these issues through a qualitative focus group approach with community-dwelling arid institutionalized older women from multiple ethnic groups. Pilot information from the proposed study will be used to develop culturally-appropriate survey instruments for a larger follow-up study on older minority women's provider-patient interactions. The long-term objective for this; line of research is to develop culturally-appropriate educational strategies to encourage effective communication between older minority women and their providers.
