Navigating the U.S. health care system as a Black woman means entering a landscape littered with obstacles. Although the racial disparities that exist in access to quality healthcare are well-documented, a new report by High Rise Legal Funding exposes a parallel burden that carries a steep financial penalty.
Data from High Rise Legal Funding shows a connection between misdiagnosis and substandard treatment to higher medical costs for Black and Latina women. During the search for answers, they are often thrust into a costly cycle, where each additional appointment and specialist visit means more copays, lost wages, and extra expenses, including transportation and childcare.
High Rise Legal Funding found that Black women face the highest rates of misdiagnosis across nearly every disease category, including heart disease, cancer and mental health disorders. The most significant disparity can be found in maternal health. At just 14 percent of the nation’s female population, Black women account for 40 percent of maternal deaths. The report also pinpoints patterns of inequitable care in later-stage cancer diagnoses.
On a broader level, the report detailed that Black Americans bear 69 percent of the costs associated with racial and ethnic health disparities, largely due to higher rates of premature mortality.
These disparities lead to significant financial consequences for Black households, which spend nearly 20 percent of their income on healthcare premiums and out-of-pocket costs, compared to the national average of 11 percent, according to the report.
Tiffany Whitlow, who appeared on season 4 of Love & Marriage: Huntsville, is a co-founder of the healthcare tech company Acclinate. She told Newsweek that patient disregard and misdiagnosis drive up specialist costs, searching for a doctor “who will finally listen.”
Klitoni Robinson, a Black mother in Alabama, told Newsweek that she believes doctors dismissed her children, who are Black and half Latino. Her daughter’s digestive issues were repeatedly called “stomach flu” for a year and a half before doctors provided a Crohn’s disease diagnosis. The family’s medical bills reached $20,000, and paying them was “almost impossible.”
When it takes years to get a diagnosis, having affordable health coverage is even more important. Recent policy changes and debates about Medicaid and Medicare have made many Black women worry about their future coverage.
As The Root reported in April, Medicaid provides coverage for 13.2 million Black people, representing about one-third of the Black population. Additionally, about 10 percent of Black Americans receive Medicare benefits, according to Statista.
